Dear researchers, do you feel that “Wikipedia” is a useful source of information for your teaching and/or scientific endeavors? If so, please, elaborate on which respect and extent. If not, please, why? Which language version(s) of "Wikipedia" do you usually consult for teaching and/or scientific matters? Further comments? Thanks so much!
In another respect - dear researchers - notice that in this thread, although your kind answers to the posed question are gratefully appreciated, nonetheless I will not comment on them beyond a polite succinct acknowledgement: so that my opinion regarding the relevant subject matter is not revealed. In doing so, I try to avoid any undesirable potential bias, from my part, that could result in the final statistical outcome of the whole project. Please, I beg you not to regard my attitude as lack of due politeness. Thank you very much!
Yes, definitely, extremely useful! As with any source, one must, however, be careful to check the [scientific] value of the cited references [some of which are often not reliable, or, misinterpreted by the wiki author]. But, even with those warts, Wikipedia has become the most "beautiful" [convenient] of places to acquire a rapid overview of the greatest variety of scientific topics, and often the best [most timely] guide to the latest published [and even not-yet-published] research on a topic [through that same list of references; often even with links to the online source documents provided] and ofttimes the best departing-point [a bibliography of current work] for further research.
Once again, caveats on accepting anything in Wikipedia at face-value, without checking references, but shouldn't the same be true of all scientific publications?
(For my historical research) I most often use the English edition, secondarily, the Spanish (because there is much relevant to Spanish colonial history, there, that is not published in the English edition).
Yes, definitely, extremely useful! As with any source, one must, however, be careful to check the [scientific] value of the cited references [some of which are often not reliable, or, misinterpreted by the wiki author]. But, even with those warts, Wikipedia has become the most "beautiful" [convenient] of places to acquire a rapid overview of the greatest variety of scientific topics, and often the best [most timely] guide to the latest published [and even not-yet-published] research on a topic [through that same list of references; often even with links to the online source documents provided] and ofttimes the best departing-point [a bibliography of current work] for further research.
Once again, caveats on accepting anything in Wikipedia at face-value, without checking references, but shouldn't the same be true of all scientific publications?
(For my historical research) I most often use the English edition, secondarily, the Spanish (because there is much relevant to Spanish colonial history, there, that is not published in the English edition).
Yes, Wikipedia” is a useful source of a lot of information scientific, I respect this Site .Because the informations are clear, and documented with references
Bob and Ahmed:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Wikipedia is an unprecedented result of people interest in gathering, classifying, and standardizing comprehensive knowledge information in variety of fields for farther global consumption, clarification, and augmentation.
The democratic and strict rules in correcting and/or updating the articles help Wikipedia in their product quality and quantity, and allow to grow without any visible limitations.
Since the Internet discovery and proliferation, Wikipedia is one of the most wonderful and substantial events.
yes, wikipedia is useful for scientific research, may be not valid always. For effective research, refer the references which was given by wikipedia. There are reliable sources but ANYONE CAN CHANGE IT.
Regards
Overall, I've found Wikipedia to be a useful place to find overall summaries of important topics, especially when reading outside my specific discipline. The key is treating it as a tertiary source and checking references if you want more detailed information. In my experience, information is more likely to be missing than outright wrong.
Over the last few years source referencing has become much more thorough, and new pages are scrutinised far more closely. This leads to an oddity that some of the worst articles are actually a decade old, back before the community introduced more stringent standards.
The main limitation is the very varied depth of the information. This would be much improved by encouraging experts to either directly edit the encyclopedia or recommend sections of text to be added.
The fact that anyone can edit the information is sometimes applied as a criticism, however in scientific topics, pages which more people edit are usually better.
Len, Lucas, Thomas and Ales:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Dear
Wikipedia is partially interesting site to get general informations for some topics, but for teaching I don't recommend it. Certains mistakes can be found sometime. You need to verify the sources of references.
Cordialy
Marius
Yes, Wikipedia is a very useful source of information at least to start with in order to have an idea on a given subject. But often not only for that : many subjects are up to date and analyzed with sufficient depth for a first approach. If it is not (yet) the case, it is mentioned. And indeed, the references are often high quality and allow to pursue with further investigation. Of course, as for any source of information, cross-checking with other sources (Searchpedia, free lessons on internet like lectures from Collège de France, Google - though carefully -, docs in paper format, books, info on authors, check in university libraries, etc....) is always needed.
Marius, Guibert and Srivatsa:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Dear Angel,
As you know, here in Spain we have the "Princesa de Asturias" awards, which are really the best awards in our country. In 2015, Wikipedia won the award on International Cooperation.
"The growth of Wikipedia, which ranks among the ten most visited sites on the internet, has been continuous with more than 37 million articles in 288 languages, including some indigenous languages. The jury has valued the important example of international cooperation, democratic, open and participatory, in which thousands of people of all nationalities collaborate unselfishly, which has succeeded in making universal knowledge accessible to everyone in a similar line as Achieved the encyclopedist spirit of the eighteenth century."
In Spanish...
"El crecimiento de Wikipedia, que figura entre los diez sitios más visitados de internet, ha sido continuo con más de 37 millones de artículos en 288 idiomas, incluidas algunas lenguas indígenas. El jurado ha valorado el importante ejemplo de cooperación internacional, democrático, abierto y participativo, en el que colaboran desinteresadamente miles de personas de todas las nacionalidades, que ha logrado poner al alcance de todo el mundo el conocimiento universal en una línea similar a la que logró el espíritu enciclopedista del siglo XVIII."
Un saludo, Angel!
http://www.fpa.es/es/premios-princesa-de-asturias/premiados/2015-wikipedia.html?texto=acta&especifica=0
It is useful for me & my students, teaching at the Fine Arts Faculty of Cuenca. Even if it is not a valuable scientific tool, is it very helpful and fast for using inside classrooms. easy and superficial things as dates, countries of born, disciplines, and so on.
Yes, Wikipedia is one of the largest banks of global collaborative encyclopaedic knowledge and can be used as an object of study or reference for the development of research in different areas of knowledge. However, only people who study Wikipedia have an idea of their scientific potential and the quality of the content of their articles. Thus, it is necessary to promove studies and events for the dissemination of this idea. For example, believe that Wikipedia articles undergo more recent evaluations than articles submitted to certain scientific journals. I use Lusophone Wikipedia (Portuguese), but for the studies I develop use an English-language Wikipedia because of the volume of information available. An idea: begin to understand and share policies such as "Vital articles" and "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team/Assessment" that are indicative of quality about the content in it produced, Logo articles With seal types available for scientific studies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Vital_articles/Expanded/People
Miguel, José and Gian Carlo:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Dear Mr. Madrid,
yes, it may serve as a starting point into one's own research and teaching, but I like to go on to the original sources. I would never cite wikipedia, but only the original source. In this sense, wikipedia may serve as a kind of signpost.
Kind regards,
Sascha Grusche
Sascha:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Wolfgang:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Madrid, I do agree that Wikipedia is a useful portal to seek some relevant information on any given topic, but what is more important to understand here is that Wikipedia itself is not the authentic source of information, as such it is always advisable to not to cite Wikipedia as a source of information. What is good about Wikipedia is, it guides one to other relevant sources of information by cross referencing.
Here i would like to quote an example, like if we want to seek the information about the population of India and Wikipedia may give us the exact figures, but it is not advisable to cite Wikipedia as a source of information. Contrary, authoritative source of such a demographic information is the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India, hence it is always advisable to cite the authoritative source of information rather Wikipedia.
Yes, "Wikipedia" is a useful resource.
But this is the initial source.
"Wikipedia" - a source of information.
Any source must be confirmed.
This is especially true for scientific knowledge.
in my view it is good for basic information. Advanced or state of art authentic information is not available there.
It helps us to understand basics. But for details book references is necessary.
Ramesh, Wolfgang, Vyacheslav, Arkal, Konstantin and Dr. Rathore:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Sir it's very useful. Sometimes individuals judgement is required. Various scientific economic political geographical etc. Information is available at one click. It's all rounders Web page.
Munish Kumar:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
As is known by all wikis are web 2.0 tools that allow collaborative work, are a good tool to perform work in class, but are not a reliable source of information as they are not elaborated with the methodological and scientific rigor required an investigation.
Julieth:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Dear Sir,
Kindly go through these links. May be of some help to you.
1. Wikipedia Is Good for You. by James P. Purdy, http://parlorpress.com/pdf/purdy--wikipedia-is-good-for-you.pdf
2. Is wikipedia now a reliable source to use for academic papers?
https://www.wyzant.com/resources/answers/4437/is_wikipedia_now_a_reliable_source_to_use_for_academic_papers
3. Wikis and Wikipedia as a Teaching Tool: Five years later by Piotr Konieczny.
http://firstmonday.org/article/view/3583/3313#author
Dear Dr. Faizul Nisha:
Many thanks!, for your contribution to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Wikipedia is a terrific resource. In fact it is usually the first place I go for a quick answer to just about any question. But if its important I usually look for at least three repudable sources in adition to wikipedia.
Rick:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
In my opinion, Wikipedia is a useful tool when you don't know where to start. Definitely all of the informations need to be checked. Primary base of knowledge should come from scientific papers and research. But I think that it is in our best interest to update the Wikipedia with the accurate data if we have found some misleading informations.
So if we take from Wikipedia is only right that we also update the Wikipedia and make it up to date as possible.
Mohammad and Jozef:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
In my opinion, Wikipedia gives you a good general map of the subject that you want to know about in sometimes layman terms. It shows you how one thing might be related to another with external sources. Often, I would say that scientific publications (despite creating new knowledge) flood the reader with information without emphasizing the broader picture, and this is probably due to the goal of being original in science.
To learn how to perform a western blot, I would look at the Journal of Visualized Experiments (JOVE) Biology videos. To read about how to do enzyme kinetics I would look in the Journal of Chemical Education. Some places I don't know where to start so I might read a Wikipedia article. In fact, some scientists write Wikipedia articles, and for extra credit in my Parasitology class I wrote a Wikipedia article about a particular parasite. My instructor thought that it was important to catalog what we learned about something and put it out there for the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterygodermatites_peromysci
There was not a Wikipedia entry for this parasite before. Now the world knows about it. Isn't that neat?
Adron:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research. In addition, your writing a truly scientific article for Wikipedia (English) is, in my opinion, not only neat, but great too! Congratulations!
Would you be interested in looking at the rest of my questions concerning Wikipedia? They are part of a RG Research Project.
Best regards, Ángel
No
It is an open encyclopedia .. with anyone can add information and their is a greet chance possibility for error . Therefore I do not depend on it as reference neither advice my students to rely on it as a scientific source of information and they to make sure of the certainaty of tge stated information by tracing their source
Noor and Amiraslan:
Many thanks!, for your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Dear Golsa:
Many thanks!, for your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
It is really useful and so helpful. However, you cannot rely only on it and need to use other sources of information as well.
As a general source, indeed It is. But obviously, if you want specifics of any one topuc, you will hace to aim to use real scientific literature.
Dear Osama, Hassan and Jesús:
Many thanks! For your answers to my question: certainly, they will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
Yes, Wikipedia is a useful source of information and a teaching assistant to expand knowledge and transfer information to the student. It contains comprehensive and easy information and contains multiple links.
Dear Ashraf:
Many thanks! For your answer to my question: certainly, it will be very helpful for my intended research.
Best regards, Ángel
I do not feel that Wikipedia is a useful source of information for my teaching and / or scientific endeavors because it is open to all and some information is added by incompetent or competent people and this information is not removed quickly
Yes of course ! Some scholars are apprehensive about citing wikipaedia as a reference but i always cite wikipedia as and when needed in my articles, except 1 reviewer opposition so far, otherwise have never ever heard anything negative for citing wiki. The beauty of wiki is being a “ dynamic” reference. I would Strongly recommend for your scientific endeavors, teaching and learning source.
Wikipedia contains a lot of unverified information. Wikipedia can be used very limitedly only as a reference resource. Wikipedia cannot be used as a source of scientific knowledge and material for scientific research.
Yes, it is useful to gain an overview for a particular subject. However, for details, we need other sources or references
In general, I consult wikipedia when I am preparing dissemination topics or when my youngest children ask me about a subject that is far from my training, but I review very well the information it provides. For topics related to teaching or research, I don't use wikipedia.
Hi
Yea certainly. It gives us plenty of information. i do get help to know many things in Wikipedia. It is one of the trusted site to get correct information.
Best
طبعا لا يمكن ذلك لعدة أسباب : معلومات غير موثقة، يكتبها هواة،متغيرة متغيرة دوما، رغم ذلك قد تفيد الذين يبحرون في الفضاء الافتراضي. لتدعيم ثقافتهم العامة.
It is a good first source to get information. Watch out for information that is unverified or not confirmed. For citation purposes it is better to go to the actual articles cited in Wiki read them thoroughly and use those as the sources of citation in your paper.
Wikipedia is useful in quick responses and in taking general information, but it can not be ever adopted as a reliable source from which we draw information and data and install it in scientific research, because simply anyone can put any wrong idea in it without any arbitration and scientific confirmation. For this reason, right and wrong can exist in Wikipedia. Researchers should not use it as a source of scientific research.
Wikipedia is a very important source of information , they not only give the fundamentals they also give references . I find it useful also I must admit I donate annually to them (of course nominal amount).
I feel Wikipedia is a useful source as it seems to be a premade synthesis of sorts by others. I find it useful in extending studies, but understand as the information presented is readily changeable the wiki source is not refereed and citable. I access via US and though a wiki space is fluid and interactive, I find included primary reference sources useful in citation analysis.
Of course, it is one of the most important sources on which it was based
Yes, very useful, especially as it refers to the sources used where it facilitates the search in a particular subject, especially in English.
Wikipedia is quite useful, but never sufficient as a source. However it very often indicates the main basic original sources of the subject concerned. Following these sources carefully may then clarify confirm or deny some of the details provided by Wikipedia. All in all Wikipedia makes a good start.
Wikipedia is useful in quick responses and in taking general information, but it can not be ever adopted as a reliable source from which we draw information and data and install it in scientific research, because simply anyone can put any wrong idea in it without any arbitration and scientific confirmation. For this reason, right and wrong can exist in Wikipedia. Researchers should not use it as a source of scientific research.
Wikipedia is useful, I think. For most people, also for scientists, it is a starting point for search. Even if you may not use it as reference in scientific papers. I consult the Dutch and English versions.
هو مصدر مفيد، ولكن معلوماته ليست دائماً دقيقة؛ كون البرنامج يسمح باضافة معلومات جديدة للجميع
Yes , I think it is a useful sources of an overview information. However to go deep into these, It is preferable to check with the origin of these information
هي إحدى الموسوعات التي تضم العديد من المعلومات والمعارف والعلوم ويمكن أن تفيد الباحث والمتعلم
Hi,
Wikipedia gives us the preliminary knowledge of a piece of information, which we require. However, when we are in a time crisis and need to cram way too many things in our minds, Wikipedia does help a lot. It has done so to me many a time.
I use Wikipedia for primary information. After that I move to relevant sources.
I think it is a useful source, but only for basic information, that must be faced, critically, with other (more) relevant sources. As Bob Skiles, I most often use the English edition, normally with more extensive information. Depending on the subjects, quality of information is very variable. I must say I have already found much nonsense and gross errors. As teacher, one of the things that worries me deeply, it is general observation (increasingly frequent) that students "copy/paste" wikipedia texts, into their texts, without any reference of the source, and with absolute absence of critical awareness. Therefore, wikipedia also has its dangers.
Obviously so but after consulting with proper text / e-book / specialized article.
Helpful but not a reference for academics as not peer reviewed
Absolutely no also for students who should focus on reading journal articles
Yes , for teaching and other things it can be useful especially for something when you have no information on it , it will explain it properly .
All depends what you are looking for. For scientific topics I find the English Wikipedia superior to the French Wikipedia. However many subjects are incomplete (for both languages)
Not useful for academic work. Students should search authoritative journals as no proper editing at wiki.
Given the ocean load of articles via Google students should engage with substantive literature.
As for professors...
Yes, I often use Wikipedia if I need general information about the subject. Then, I usually read references the Wiki article suggests to get more scientifically reliable sources. And then, perhaps, more references, etc.
Within the circles I where work, Wikipedia is not considered an appropriate source for any form of academic research -- even researching lectures. As intimated in another response there are many better resources available online. These include document and data repositories operated and maintained by many levels of government (e.g., statistical data, government documents), WHO, the CDC in Atlanta, NGOs, etc. Other types of data and sources available online include the Vatican, institutional repositories, corporate annual reports, peer-reviewed online journals, etc. In short, a wealth of first rate data may be found on the internet as long as a person knows how to search for it.
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