Question

I choose to believe that everyone's goal is the same, to create an accurate family record for all of us.

Comments

Why the down vote? This is a fairly neutral statement.

I gave it an up vote.

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Diana, This statement is very similar to your previous post. Is there something you need help with or are you just making an observation?

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I suppose a down vote would mean that the person disagrees with my statement.

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I am unsure how that comment poste twice. I did spend some time trying to locate how to delete. However, I was not successful

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You cannot delete, but you can hide and close to remove a thread from the stream.

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Thank you I will look into that

Answer 1

Yes.  But people have different ideas about "accurate".  It's amazing what people are able to believe.

Comments

Yup sometimes cousins and nephews have a sir name in a document of relation and it is used as the persons wife sir name just so you can be related to the signers of the Magna Carta lol. and fake parents that say de al la vere hahah. But wait theres more... it came from a generated family tree made in 1998,and has been believed too be true for so long they refuse too make changes XD. good times.

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I agree, but the effort is still there. We are human and thank you goodness, information can be edited.

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Oh we all make mistakes.  But that's not the problem.

Answer 2

Yes the goal  is to create one accurate global family tree, which is why we should avoid creating duplicates like Benjamin Freeman and Benjamin Freeman, both with wife Dorcas.

Comments

Thank you looking at the referenced Benjamin Freeman's in you post, clearly When I was creating my Benjamin Freeman, that data I entered did not pop up a match that appeared to be one and the same Benjamin Freeman, Thank you for pointing that out and I will request a merge.

Answer 3

Accuracy demands documentation. Documentation does not include unsourced trees found elsewhere online or handed down by great grandma. As well-intentioned as many may be, this is probably the most pervasive detriment to WikiTree or any other tree building site. If you can't document it, don't add it. That is really the only way to ensure an accurate tree. That someone may want an accurate tree and believe what they add is valid, that isn't always so.

Sourcing is everything.

Comments

Wish: If only this statement was worded in this way in the help pages

Answer 4

I am actually quite interested in the balance between accurate meaning "correct and verifiable" and accurate meaning "precise".

A recent example occurred when I was entering the death date for one of my relatives. I have found the registration of the death (in the UK) which shows it was registered in the October to December quarter of 1972. I also have access to the Ancestry tree of the daughter of this person, which shows the date of death as 23 December 1972, but I have not found any independent confirmation of the precise date.

I debated for a while whether I should enter the precise date quoting both the death index and the Ancestry tree as sources. However given the strong opposition I have seen to using Ancestry trees as sources, which I can certainly understand and sympathise with, I ended up entering the death date as "about November 1972" and just quoting the death index, which is the maximum accuracy that any other researcher can verify (assuming they can't find a source that I missed, in which case they can update it). This is more "verifiable" but less "precise", so whether that makes it more "accurate" or not I'm not sure.

I'm sure this won't be the last time I am faced with a situation like this, so I wonder what approach other people normally take?

Comments

For this particular situation (daughter reporting the death date of her father) I would be inclined to accept the date, with an explanation of the circumstances. I have used the death date of my father as an event witnessed by myself without a death certificate, for instance.

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This is a great example to talk about, Paul.  Personally I prefer it when the information in the name/date/location fields is "verifiable", leaving ambiguities and missing data to be discussed at any necessary length in the biography.  The way you coded the death date seems perfectly appropriate to me.  I could see going the other way though, if you personally were familiar with the genealogy research of the Ancestry tree creator and knew she did a good job with precision and accuracy.  

The same decision comes up over and over again looking at Find a Grave memorials.  I find I am constantly making judgment calls based on context about whether the data is verifiable, or merely precise but unfortunately unsourced.