Got into a huge argument a few days ago with a friend over the academic acceptability of Wikipedia. It started because the UC system–or at least my school–is considering a complete and permanent ban on Wikipedia as a research tool and a possible citation. My guess is that in 5 years, you’ll be able to quote it in papers. Perhaps it’s because I remember how not too long who the ENTIRE internet was off limits as far as academic research was concerned. Why? Ignorance. Now of course, that stance has been recanted, and every college student knows how to use to the web for scholarly research. So why do I think it will be allowed?

–The argument that Glenn Reynolds puts forth in Army of Davids is worth repeating. Let’s say Encyclopedia Britannica has a 100 total articles and Wikipedia has a 1000 (more like a trillion, but let’s keep it simple). And the scale of accuracy is 0 to 10. Due to Wikipedia’s lack of certification, the accuracy of each article is 7, and with Britannica’s more strenuous process is a 9. The problem however, is that for each topic that Britannica neglects to address, it gets a zero. So when you stretch the timeline out–you’ll see that Wikipedia is overwhelmingly more accurate on average because it actually covers more material.

–The average error correction time on Wikipedia is incredibly fast. I can’t track the numbers down right now, but I remember it being something like under 10 minutes.

–A large group on semi-informed people is statistically more accurate than an incredibly small group of experts. Read Wisdom of Crowds, or anything on “Future Games.” And those are normally applied to things that haven’t even happened yet. So to assert that a crowd is better at predicting the future than they are at simply recording the past is ridiculous.

–The majority of information on Wikipedia isn’t even up for dispute. It’s dates, birthplaces, timelines, etc; which, if anyone stopped to think for a minute, they would realize are the ONLY things people quote encyclopedias for anyway. Only the especially juvenile use secondary sources for the crucial parts of their research papers anyway. As a general rule, in the meat of a paper you never quote dictionaries, encyclopedias or textbooks. There is no reason a student shouldn’t be able to say “Wikipedia places his birth in France during the mid-14th century.

The problem here is essentially a conflict of interest. Professors–as per maintaining their livelihood–have a vested interest in preventing the mass proliferation of knowledge. At its core, Wikipedia renders the average professor obsolete. It removes the human limitations of the middleman and replaces it with an infinitely large and more accurate source of information. Of course, they’re going to fight it. Students too are biased. They’d like to utilize the ease of Wikipedia–letting others collect and synthesize the vastness of academia for them.

So the solution lies somewhere in the middle. Professors–CollegeBoard perhaps–should get together and, either with the help of Wikipedia or independently, and begin to certify articles that meet their collective burden. Out of the millions of entries, some are obviously unacceptable. But the majority of them are detailed and helpful. With a seal of approval, students should be able to incorporate this wealth of human experience into their journey.

The university system is supposed to be a collection of the world’s greatest minds that’ve come together for one purpose–to teach and educate. It’s terrible ironic then, that when a computer database comes alone and automates the works of those greatest minds, that they’d fight it tooth and nail. It is simply too easy to dismiss Wikipedia as inaccurate or unscholarly. Statistically, that assertion is flat wrong. It defies the massive advancements we’ve made in psychology, economics, politics, and mathematics. A larger selectorate is smarter than a smaller one. Fact.

Sorry, I’m so heavy on this. But I just added to the Book Quotes and Passages Thread.

HERE are some absolutely stellar pieces from Gavin De Becker, who wrote The Gift of Fear.

“The way circus elephants are trained demonstrates this dynamic well: When young, they are attached by heavy chains to large stakes driven deep into the ground. They pull and yank and strain and struggle, but the chain is too strong, the stake too rooted. One day they give up, having learned they cannot pull free, and from that day forward they can be “chained” with a slender rope. When this enormous animal feels any resistance, thought it has the strength to pull the whole circus tent over, it stops trying. Because it believes it cannot, it cannot.

This opera is being sung in homes all over America right, the stakes driven in to the ground, the heavy chains attached, the children reaching the point they believe they cannot pull free. And at that point, they cannot. ”

De Becker, Gavin

The Gift of Fear

I can’t take the original credit for catching the applicability and transcendence of such an anecdote, but I can expand on it. Tucker pointed me towards Vincent Bugliosi–the man who tried Manson (Helter Skelter is the #1 crime bestseller of all time) and the Palliko-Stockton murders, and said I could learn from Bugliosi’s rhetorical strategy. And that his method of pre-emption was particularly clever.

“Whenever I know the defense is going to present evidence damaging to the

judge’s chambers or in open court.”–Vincent Bugliosi, “Till Death Do Us Part”

And so the above passage is the one I really latched on to. Remember that the prosecution goes first in closing arguments, which can indeed leave them open to attacks on context or interpretation. But Bugliosi turned this curse into an asset. Instead of waiting for criticism from the defense, he criticized himself–pointing out the prosecution’s own weakness, or at least acknowledging the jury’s potential to see one. And thusly, when it comes time for the defense to mouth the same words, they appear shill or redundant. Like he says, it doesn’t eliminate the validity of the critique, rather the volume at which it is said. You frame the debate on your terms, and then the response, at least to some degree, is under your control. Of course, no one is arguing complete transparency of strategy. Machiavelli would roll over in his grave at that. In this case, you’re simply using the appearance of nobility or truth to your benefit–and the cost is slight illumination of a few specifically chosen faults. After all, if someone is willing to talk openly of something, it can’t really be that bad, right? That is the impression you want to give.

The implications of this is twofold. One, realize that when you see transparency or seemingly self-deprecating honesty, be suspicious. Realize that there may be ulterior motives. That perhaps your attention is being directed at something with the hope of a superficial glance at the present instead of an investigative one on your own recognizance. Two, see how rarely our leaders or businesses use this to their advantage. How often is the Bush administration secretive about things that we would have likely dismissed had then been forthcoming. And how this repeated mistake has lead to almost a universal mistrust of the government and thus a strategic crippling. There is an abundance of political theorists who think Clinton could have avoided his historical scarlet letter had he addressed the accusations openly and in advance–much in the same manner that Gavin Newsome recently has.

Accordingly, this will become something I’d like to incorporate into my daily strategy. Putting forth–in open court–the manageable weaknesses that I have, and think that if attacked I could sustain. Mark Cuban said something recently to the effect of “lies in sunlight are less dangerous than ones that live in the shadows.” People are very much aware of this fact; so when you put debatable issues out for all to see, their ominous nature disappears. From this, their potential to harm you is lessened. What Bugliosi did was take criticisms off the table, ironically, by pushing them closer towards the center. So for instance, in some sort of political discussion, look three or four arguments ahead and bring them up yourself. Tacking on a “but I still don’t think that changes the fact that…” blocks a check or even a checkmate from occurring. Then, that you seem more honest than your counterparts is an added benefit.

When you look at your own actions, or that of your company, or of your friends, ask “How could I defeat myself?” Play devil’s advocate, always. And then incorporate those opposing strategies into your own. Turn the counterargument into collieries of the original–and by default the counterargument is no longer an effective one. As John Boyd advocated, you’re simply getting inside their loop and making it your own. As with all strategies, there are exceptions, but I think the applications of this one, in both business, war and life are pretty large.