“Defenders of traditional authority will object to the relativism of all this, but relativism is all we’ve got — the rise of the scientific method has taken away certainty and replaced it with nothing but process and probability. An authority isn’t a person or institution who is always right — ain’t no such animal. An authority is a person or institution who has a process for lowering the likelihood that they are wrong to acceptably low levels. And over the last ten years, Wikipedia has been passing that test in an increasing number of circumstances. And this is what I think is really worth celebrating as Wikipedia begins its 10th decade. It took one of the best ideas of the last 500 years — peer review — and expanded its field of operation so dramatically that it changes the way authority is configured. So Happy Birthday, Wikipedia, and thanks for giving us so much to think about.”
Clay Shirky on Wikipedia’s 10th Anniversary
Notes
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