Simviation Forums

One of the most revered reference books in the world has admitted to containing several significant errors - after they were spotted by a 12-year-old boy.
Lucian George trawled through the 32 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and found inaccuracies in the entries on Poland and the wildlife of eastern Europe.
The first mistake was a reference to the small town of Chochim - which the encyclopaedia placed in Moldova, according to newspaper reports.
Lucian, a pupil at the independent Highgate junior school in north London, said this was "wrong". "Chochim is in Ukraine."
He also found that the encyclopaedia had wrongly stated that the European bison can only be found in the Bialowieza forest in Poland.
Lucian told the Times: "The European bison also inhabits the southern mountains of Poland, Russia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, eastern Slovakia and the Romanian Carpathians."
The youngster acquired his knowledge because his mother is Polish and he has always been fascinated by the history of the country. He spends a month every year on a farm in Yamy, south west Poland.
Lucian's father Gabriel, said he was just a "normal kid". He told the Daily Mail: "He is intelligent and is surrounded by other intelligent children but he enjoys his Simpsons on TV just like anyone else."
Anita Wolff, the senior editor of the 15th edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica, thanked Lucian for pointing out "several errors and misleading statements". The section on Poland is now being rewritten.
Lucian said that despite the mistakes, he still thought the encyclopaedia was the best reference book he knew.

Nice to see the professionals outsmarted by a schoolboy

The biggest error seems to be the 12-year old boy reading an encyclopedia. Boys of this age don't read ency's - they do things we don't want to know.

Shall we send him FS9 and ask him to send his error-list to MS? Who knows .....

The biggest error seems to be the 12-year old boy reading an encyclopedia. Boys of this age don't read ency's - they do things we don't want to know.

Shall we send him FS9 and ask him to send his error-list to MS? Who knows .....

lmao

The biggest error seems to be the 12-year old boy reading an encyclopedia. Boys of this age don't read ency's - they do things we don't want to know.

Shall we send him FS9 and ask him to send his error-list to MS? Who knows .....

When I was around this age I was fascinated by encyclopedias and any other kind of book on history or how things worked, to this day I am still a knowledge hound, however I hate to argue, so if someone has their facts wrong about a subject, I rarely correct them unless I know them very well, people get very defensive when you try to tell them they are wrong or have their facts mixed up.
Personally I won't even comment on a subject unless I know what I'm about to say is a fact and it can be proven.

Nobody's infallible.


Except me that is....

hehe, somebody has to find a forum..:-)

I've got a guy at work who just got divorced, and bought a brand new set of encyclopedias to start reading...  ::)

Personally I won't even comment on a subject unless I know what I'm about to say is a fact and it can be proven.

Definitely NOT moderator material!  that type of attitude would not get you anywhere here!

The most fun is to comment on that-on-which-you-know-nothing-about, in a Very Authoritative Manner, and then sit back a watch how you are refuted!

The most fun is to comment on that-on-which-you-know-nothing-about, in a Very Authoritative Manner, and then sit back a watch how you are refuted!

You're preaching to the converted.

[quote]


Definitely NOT moderator material!

I rarely correct them unless I know them very well, people get very defensive when you try to tell them they are wrong or have their facts mixed up.

I do this every day to complete strangers.  ;D

To be honest in my opinion, i am surprised Britanica took any notice of a twelve year olds findings.  :D

When I was around this age I was fascinated by encyclopedias and any other kind of book on history or how things worked,

In my experience the average 12 year-old is brighter & far more sensible than most people give them credit for. I was particularly knowlegeable at that age & considered well above-average. Wonder what happened?

I do like to make fun of things I don't understand and know nothing about.

This is one of my hobbies. In fact I excel at spreading confusion all around me wherever I go. A confusionist of the finest water. I'm famous for it around here & people have been known to avoid me in the street. I even confuse myself at times.

I must admit the urge to make something up when someone asks me about something is occasionally (always) too hard to bare.

Yep i find that i too, can not easily make things up on the spot but once in a blue moon i manage to excell and can make up anything, best time of the year that is..

lol, Encyclopedia Brittanica foiled (maybe they have some evil plan to foil the whole world and claim superior knowledge ). Wikipedia works just as well.