Wikipedia entry for Thermate has been edited. Is it correct?

[BigAl]

Here's the comparison between the current version and a change done a couple days ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Thermate&diff=196844387&oldid=195610060

Someone removed a "it is claimed that" (with no attribution) to the claim that sulfur was found (also without attribution.) There is also the implication that it was elemental sulfur and that it proves the existence of thermate.

[Dave Rogers]

Here's the comparison between the current version and a change done a couple days ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Thermate&diff=196844387&oldid=195610060

Someone removed a "it is claimed that" (with no attribution) to the claim that sulfur was found (also without attribution.) There is also the implication that it was elemental sulfur and that it proves the existence of thermate.

Whoever edited it didn't fix the syntax very well. The construction "allegations claim that... and that..." has been altered to "since... and that..." by the edit. Factual errors are bad enough, but poor grammar - well, it's worse than the truther criticisms of the NIST report!

The last two sentences of that paragraph seem to have been edited in too. They refer to "Also providing evidence for this theory", where the test above originally relates to allegations and doesn't mention evidence.

I imagine this entry has been edited a lot, and will go on to be edited a lot more.

Dave

[dudalb]

Frankly, any artical in Wikipedia about a controversial subject needs to be taken with a ton of salt. They change about every five minutes.
And you are right: I am NOT a big fan of Wikepedia because it is a enclylopedia that anybody can edit. Accuracy and fact is not a democratic process.

[cisco]

Frankly, any artical in Wikipedia about a controversial subject needs to be taken with a ton of salt. They change about every five minutes.
And you are right: I am NOT a big fan of Wikepedia because it is a enclylopedia that anybody can edit. Accuracy and fact is not a democratic process.
You're right that controversial topics need to be taken with a grain of salt, BUT, I gotta step in and defend Wikipedia here.

Ninety-nine percent of the factual statements made on Wikipedia are cited. Of the remaining 1 percent, 0.9% say "citation needed." You can go directly to the source material and decide for yourself if it is reliable. I've found that it overwhelmingly is.

"Anyone can edit Wikipedia" is a myth. More of a misspeak, perhaps. Anyone can add to Wikipedia. You cannot remove information from Wikipedia. Click on History and it's all right there. Click Discussion for explanations of why things were changed.

Wikipedia is the most comprehensive, easily accessible source of knowledge I've ever known. Being a live entity, I find it more than acceptably accurate, and more timely than anything in print.

[BigAl]

People need to re-learn to read critically and to have a sense of proportion to how familiar they are with the with the subject matter. Wikipedia is good in that it may show both sides in what I will for the moment call a "debate" but only off the reader knows how to use it. A formal reference like the Britannica probably never does that.

The external references and citations may be the best part of an otherwise miserable article.

[flameowl]

I'm not a wiki editor, but I'd be taking exception to the claim on the thermate page "that molten steel was found up to five weeks after 9/11". Any wiki editors out there want to log in and challenge that as POV and unsubstantiated (citation needed)? Pretty much any time they say that there is molten steel it should be challenged right? Particularily since the article mentions analysis taken from photographs as proof of thermate.

[ElMondoHummus]

Molten metal was sighted on the order of days to weeks after the collapses. Even CNN noted this; I'll dig through and see if I can find that source.

Frankly, I'm not concerned about fantasists using or misusing that claim to buttress their thermite hypotheses, because such sightings do not help their case. Even if you assume that the metal was or included steel components, there's still no explanation of how thermite was involved in reducing those components to a molten state. Most likely, what sightings of molten metal did occur was due to those metal pieces melting due to the fires underneath the rubble piles; those were known to be exceptionally hot. A paper Dr. Greening referred to noted rubble pile temperatures "ranging from 400F to more than 2,800F" ("SH&E at Ground Zero", Professional Safety, May 2002, page 27. Sorry, no internet link for the article). And given the existence of those rubble pile fires, why hypothesize thermite to begin with? If their argument is that the thermite initially melted the metals, then the fires kept them molten, they're exposing themselves to an unprovable hypothesis, given that they have zero proof that the metal was molten before it was covered by the debris. Or in short, the argument the present as proving the mechanism actually does not prove it, because they're admitting to a different, verified mechanism right in front of them, and they have no way to separate molten metal from the debris fires from metal melted by thermite.

So if they want to try to make that claim, I say let them. Even if they presuppose steel rather than other metals (aluminum, etc.) in those sightings, they still don't have a link between its molten state and thermite.

[Cl1mh4224rd]

It looks like the junk has been cut from the main article for the moment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermate

ETA: Whoever made those edits was obviously a truther, and not even for the references to the conspiracy theory. Their other references were stupendously lazy:

Also providing evidence for this theory is the video of the towers burning. The video shows sparks and molten steel {{fact}} falling from the area of a steel support beam.


"[T]he video", as if there is only one video of the towers. :rolleyes:

[BenBurch]

Thanks for pointing out this article. I have removed some material that was extraneous, and will attempt to source this article.

[leftysergeant]

Would it surprise anyone were the source of these odd entries turn out to be someone we know?

[gumboot]

You're right that controversial topics need to be taken with a grain of salt, BUT, I gotta step in and defend Wikipedia here.


It's worth mentioning that an analysis of Wikipedia's accuracy was conducted, comparing it to leading encyclopedias, and it was consistently about the same level of accuracy on most subjects. Wikipedia's real advantage is that it covers subjects that encyclopedias don't cover...

In a way I even like the "controversial" articles - at least with Wikipedia it is usually obvious that the subject is debated, making one more cautious about presenting "facts" whereas a typical encyclopedia will present even contentious issues as "truth" often failing to acknowledge the debate about it.

I find Wikipedia to be fantastic for two things - the first is to give me a basic grounding in something I know nothing about - the second is to provide a comprehensive list of initial sources for further research if required.

Certainly I wouldn't trust Wikipedia on its own, but I wouldn't provide something from Britannica as evidence either.