r/college 1d ago

"Peer-reviewed" article cites wikipedia?

This supposed peer-reviewed article published in AMAMIHE: Journal of Applied Philosophy, uses a link to wikipedia. Should I trust it?

I already used it in my annotated bibliography and a large part of the structure of my essay depends on it. I could find another article obviously, but it would be a lot more convenient to use this one. Should I just find a new one?

Edit: I decided to use another one just to be safe but for future reference based on the context could we assume its just not a great source to use in academic papers? it is referenced here "According to Gettier it is possible to make a mistake as

knowledge a true belief whose justification is based on epistemic guess or luck

rather than sufficient reasons or good evidence. He maintained that if justified

true belief analysis is to rule out all possible cases of epistemic luck, it needs to

be modified with a forth condition (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettier

problem). In essence, Gettier was of the view that, justified true belief alone is

not capable in its sufficiency for accounting for our knowledge claims hence

our justification for believing a particular thing might be false as such cannot be

regarded as the case of knowledge."

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u/apnorton 1d ago

What's the nature of the citation?  The reason Wikipedia isn't generally considered a reliable source is because anyone can edit it; however, sometimes a paper might want to reference something's existence on Wikipedia or a "general perceived view" of a topic, for which citing Wikipedia would make sense. 

There's also a view in some fields that you should cite whatever you reference, even if you have other, better sources that duplicate the information.

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u/alaskawolfjoe 1d ago

Is it used as a source or as an example?

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u/No_Jaguar_2570 1d ago

It depends entirely on the context in which it’s being cited. How is the citation used?

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u/hornybutired Assoc Prof of Philosophy 1d ago

As others have said, it depends on the nature of the citation.

However, AMAMIHE: Journal of Applied Philosophy is not the same as Journal of Applied Philosophy. The latter is a pretty well respected journal. The former doesn't really have a footprint in the field. I can't find any information about the editorial board and it appears to have zero impact index. From a scholarship standpoint, you might as well be citing some rando's blog.

If you're an undergrad, it might not matter - the prof might just want to see you out there looking up sources. But idk your specific situation.