"Conservapedia is a wiki-based web encyclopedia project written from an Amercentric social conservative and Conservative Christian point of view."
-Wikipedia on Conservapedia

"Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia founded by entrepreneur and athiest Jimmy Wales and philosophy professor Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001. Despite its official "neutrality policy", Wikipedia has a strong liberal bias."
-Conservapedia on Wikipedia

Since the advent of the internet, online sources have slowly replaced printed works as the common source for research. Many would argue that the culmination of this gradual transformation is Wikipedia, a online source controversial for allowing its information to be edited by its users. In cyberspace where anonymity is ubiquitous and pseudonyms are the norm, it is impossible to enforce responsibility in posting accurate information, and therefore it is easy for Wikipedia to be flooded with misinformation (a la Stephen Colbert's infamous elephant hoax).

On the other end of the spectrum is Conservapedia, which boldly proclaims itself "The Trustworthy Encyclopedia". Despite claims to be more open than Wikipedia, all of Conservapedia's top 5 articles cannot be edited by anyone outside of the 31 mysterious Administrators. As a result Conservapedia's articles on Evolution, Homosexuality, and Atheism contain misused data, flawed logic, quotes taken out of context, and even bold faced lies. Although Conservapedia touts the contents of these entries as undisputed fact, a quick trip to the "talk page" of one of these articles will show that there is anything but consensus on the issue.

The question is this:
-Does Wikipedia's ability to be edited by anyone and everyone add to or take away from its credibility. On the one hand, there is no accountability for an individual to post accurate information. Conversely, by allowing everyone a chance to contribute, information must be widely accepted by the public.


For those who would like to debate the credibility of Conservapedia, I am perfectly willing to discuss it. However, it would be greatly appreciated if discussion and comments were focused on the above question.