Nine Theses on Wikipedia: A Special Feature
I submit these nine theses to Wikipedia’s community and to the world. I do this, as Martin Luther said when he posted his famous 95 theses, “Out of love for the truth and the desire to elucidate it.” A quarter of a century ago, Jimmy Wales’ company Bomis hired me to start a free encyclopedia. The first draft, from which we learned much, was Nupedia—it made slow progress. So, a year later, on January 2, 2001, when a friend told me about wikis, I immediately began imagining a wiki encyclopedia.

My Blog
Response to David Wiley on an education “badge” system
Here is my response to David Wiley’s very interesting blog post about an educational badge system, similar to the Mozilla Open Badges program. David, I didn’t mean to be unpleasant in my Twitter
5 comments on Response to David Wiley on an education “badge” system8 minutesWhat is the best way to teach geography?
I’m wondering: what is the best way to teach geography? I’ve started a system with H. (age 5) which seems to be working reasonably well, but I wonder if, perhaps, we should be
8 minutesI gih dah bah! (update about the baby’s “education”)
It’s been a while since I reported about Baby E., especially in any detail. So here’s maybe my first detailed report (he’s now 11 months) about what we’re doing with him and what’s
14 minutesOur “curriculum”: update about the boys (August 2011)
Help Screen Options WordPress 3.2.1 is available! Please update now. Dolly’ll never go away Add New Post Blog posts options Post image*: Publish Preview Status: Draft Edit Visibility: Public Edit Publish immediately Edit Move to Trash Categories All Categories Most Used Citizendium Education Latest Post Other Weird Stuff Publishing Theory Communication Knowledge Privacy Uncategorized Wiki…
28 minutesSee a ReadingBear demo and volunteer to help finish the job!
Regular readers of this blog know that I’ve been spent most of this year developing a free reading tutorial. We were calling it WatchKnow Reader, but now it’s called Reading Bear. I need
3 minutesReply to Nathan Jurgenson on anti-intellectualism
Thanks to Nathan Jurgenson for a thoughtful critique of “Is there a new geek anti-intellectualism?” I wish I had more time to respond, especially since it is so earnestly intellectual itself. The following will
7 minutesShould we teach math in elementary school?
From the anti-intellectualism department, arguably: An emeritus psych professor, Peter Gray, has made the argument in Psychology Today that we should not teach math in elementary school (K-6). (Hat tip, BrillKids Forum.) Well,
6 minutesUpdate about the boys (June 2011)
I’ve changed quite a bit of what I’ve been doing with H. For many months, I was following a schedule according to which I assigned specific subjects to specific meals (we read, or
12 minutesGeek anti-intellectualism: replies
My essay on “geek anti-intellectualism” hit a nerve. I get the sense that a lot of geeks are acting–quite unusually for them–defensively, because I’ve presented them with a sobering truth about themselves that
21 minutesIs there a new geek anti-intellectualism?
This essay can be read in my 2020 book, Essays on Free Knowledge. Perhaps ironically, it is no longer free. UPDATE: I’ve posted a very long set of replies. UPDATE 2: I’ve decided to
1 minute
Support the Knowledge Standards Foundation:

- I invited my X peeps to ask me questions and then "like" the various questions, and I would upload the answers in video form. Here it is! Christian identity – 1:10 "Call no man teacher" – 9:25 Role of government – 15:45 Authority & resistance – 19:15 Wikipedia labor – 24:20 Net value of Wikipedia […]
- Made for beginners, family, friends, study group members. Most of this stuff is obvious after you use LLMs long enough. If you have more good ideas, put them in comments!
- While I was raised Christian, I lost my faith in my teens, as so many do. But my life has been a truth-seeking quest, and I ended up earning a Ph.D. in philosophy (as I was starting Wikipedia). My reasons for disbelief fell away one by one; eventually I read the Bible, finally, for good […]