Week 14 - Fatima Paulina Lopez Diaz

 

Wikipedia is Now as Reliable as Scientific Articles

For many years, people were told not to trust Wikipedia. Teachers, professors, and experts often said: “Don’t use Wikipedia as a source.” Since anyone could edit an article, it seemed too easy for mistakes or false information to appear.

Nowadays, research shows that Wikipedia articles in English are now as accurate and reliable as scientific papers, especially in topics like medicine, science, and technology. 

From the start, Wikipedia was built by volunteers. Anyone could edit articles, which helped the site grow fast. But in the early days, this also led to problems: some articles were incomplete, wrong, or even vandalized.

Over time, the Wikipedia community created better ways to manage content. Today, the most important and popular articles are watched by many expert editors, including scientists, doctors, and other professionals. They check for accuracy and make sure that articles follow high standards.

In addition, Wikipedia uses computer programs (called “bots”) that help detect bad edits quickly. When someone tries to add false or harmful information, these bots alert human editors, who can then review and fix the problem.

Because of this teamwork between humans and technology, Wikipedia articles now stay more accurate than ever before.

A famous study by the journal Nature in 2005 compared Wikipedia’s science articles to those in Encyclopedia Britannica. The result? Wikipedia had only slightly more mistakes. Since then, Wikipedia has only gotten better.

More recent studies confirm this. A 2020 study in PLOS ONE found that English Wikipedia’s medical articles were mostly accurate and well-sourced. Another study in 2022 found that many scientists themselves use Wikipedia as a helpful starting point for research.

In fact, scientific papers today often reference Wikipedia articles. Many universities and organizations also say it’s fine to use Wikipedia — as long as you check the original sources listed in the articles.

One reason Wikipedia is so useful is that it stays current. Science moves fast. Sometimes, it takes months or years for new research to appear in journals or textbooks. On Wikipedia, new information can be added in minutes or hours.

For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Wikipedia’s medical pages were updated constantly as new facts came out. In many cases, these articles were more up-to-date than official sources or academic papers.

Wikipedia is also very transparent. Every change to an article is logged and visible. You can check an article’s “History” page to see who edited it and when. You can also visit the “Talk” page to see how editors are discussing the article.

This openness helps readers trust what they’re reading and understand how the article has changed over time.

Another big strength of Wikipedia is its community. Thousands of volunteers work hard to improve articles. Many of them are experts who want to share their knowledge freely.

Wikipedia also works with scientific groups, universities, and libraries. These partnerships help editors get access to good research and improve the quality of references.

Thanks to this global effort, many science and medicine articles on Wikipedia are now as reliable as those in scientific journals.



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