• Question: Do you use wikipedia when doing some homework?

    Asked by lollol to Darren, Deuan, Duncan, Lori-An, Michelle on 18 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Duncan Hull

      Duncan Hull answered on 18 Jun 2010:

      Scientists don’t get homework (well I don’t!) but more and more scientists are using wikipedia in their work. There are obviously some issues with the reliability and accuracy of wikipedia, but there are several attempts to get scientists contributing more data to wikipedia, and correcting errors where they exist.

      A good example of this is the WikiProject: Molecular and Cellular Biology
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia%3AWikiProject_Molecular_and_Cellular_Biology

      A group of scientists trying to improve the quality and quality of scientific information in wikipedia, with a special focus on biology.

      Other projects exist in Chemistry, Physics and Mathematics too.

    • Photo: Lori-An Etherington

      Lori-An Etherington answered on 18 Jun 2010:

      yes sometimes, it can be a good source of information but because it isn’t checked properly for what people are writing you have to be careful that the information is correct and check it elsewhere

    • Photo: Darren Nesbeth

      Darren Nesbeth answered on 18 Jun 2010:

      Yes.

    • Photo: Michelle Hudson-Shore

      Michelle Hudson-Shore answered on 18 Jun 2010:

      Wikipedia can be useful but you have to be careful to check that the information has several references related to it. I would probably use it as a starting point but then look up other sources of information as well.

Comments