Wikipedia talk:Verifiable but not false

This is the talk-page for essay: WP:Verifiable but not false.

Created

The Wikipedia essay "WP:Verifiable but not false" was created on 14-Oct-2010 by long-term user Wikid77 (me) to explain the importance of truth in writing Wikipedia articles, despite the alarming phrase in WP:V of "verifiability, not truth". -Wikid77 (talk) 06:24, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Purpose of essay

15-Oct-2010: The essay provides a venue to expain many aspects, of Wikipedia articles, which should be fact-checked to be true, as known by various editors. The essay offsets the attitude that "we can't assure readers that articles are true" (RARELY) when in fact, many hours are spent on articles to reject or correct untrue information. Perhaps articles are not "100% true" but articles are changed to remove known falsehoods or out-dated information, as soon as possible. The information in the essay will seem to be common sense. However, the phrase in WP:V of "verifiability, not truth" might have led others to rarely emphasize the ideas in the essay. Perhaps the phrase should be replaced as the more obvious concept of "verifiability, not perfection". -Wikid77 (talk) 06:24, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Old truths

This is generally good, but it misses an important point that we can, do and should repeat old truths, in context where they are important to history of a topic. For example if X was widely stated as fact, but it later turns out that X is incorrect, then our article will include a mention that X was believed to be true, but later shown not to be. Examples include things like death tolls from disasters being revised down, disproven scientific theories and out-of-date medical treatments. Including these would seem to be prohibited by points 2 and 3 of this essay - quoting from out of date sources is acceptable to document contemporary beliefs for example, as long as this is done in an appropriate context. I have not boldly incorporated this into the essay as I can't think how to phrase it succinctly and clearly. Thryduulf (talk) 13:44, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

Good points!👍 We are not limited to solely documenting the current state of knowledge. That means we do not allow whitewashing and historical revisionism to "update" articles by disappearing legitimate or embarrassing content. We document the history of "from then to now," the history of "how we got here," and we do that by doing as you suggest. Sometimes the connections between dots are more important than the dots themselves. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:54, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

+1

Good essay. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 18:03, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Yup. Wikipedia has an unfathomable mindshare, and journalists, academics, and even judges frequently use us as a source (and sometimes repeat misconceptions or inaccuracies from our articles). We would be irresponsible to not care about accuracy.

I just found Mr. Hsu, a reputable computer historian and usually an impeccable source, repeating a claim ("acquired NeXT outright for $429 million in cash and 1.5 million Apple shares"), which came from Wikipedia, and was provably false (it was $427m, and that number included not just cash, but shares, options, & assumed liabilities too). I've seen über-established AFP and Bloomberg publish gross inaccuracies, superbly thorough books make basic misstatements, and "newspapers of record" publish WP:PROFRINGE junk.

WP:NOTTRUTH is an important white lie we must tell newbies, to ensure POV-pushers are marginalized. An encyclopedia that "anyone can edit" must prevent stupid or malicious editors from wreaking havoc, which is why all our policies are designed to minimize subjective editorial judgment and constrain us via an outside authority (our sources), to act as a "floor" on the quality of our articles, and prevent us from going below that floor. But we ought to be well above it, and we wouldn't be doing our job seriously if we didn't strive for deep knowledge of both secondary and primary sources, and (cautiously, responsibly) resolve factual discrepancies. DFlhb (talk) 09:42, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Previous adoption discussion

This draft was proposed for promotion at WP:VPR, in a now-archived discussion (see link). DFlhb (talk) 07:37, 5 June 2023 (UTC)