Hi there Tim,
Often I ask people how they have come to their conclusions, and invariably
there is no response, as I am truly interested in case I have made a mistake
somewhere. My view is that everyone has to be aware that unless there is
documented proof, then its someone else's assumption.
Jocelyn
-----Original Message-----
From: catley-bounces(a)rootsweb.com [mailto:catley-bounces@rootsweb.com] On
Behalf Of Tim Cattley
Sent: Saturday, 22 December 2012 12:40 p.m.
To: catley(a)rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: [CATLEY] Public trees available on research sites
Thank you Chris,
I take it that you proffer helpful corrections privately or is it via the
public comments provision that the web sites provide? The latter would have
more impact for obvious reasons but would that be a step too far?
Tim
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Newall" <chris(a)rebus.demon.co.uk>
To: <catley(a)rootsweb.com>
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2012 6:43 PM
Subject: Re: [CATLEY] Public trees available on research sites
When I was a novice researcher I made an assumption which resulted in
me
assigning the wrong set of parents to one of my ancestors. Another
researcher pointed out to me where I was wrong. I am eternally grateful
to him for that and have been much more careful since then. I now shun
assumptions like the plague unless they cannot be avoided, in which case
I make clear that my conclusions are 'provisional'.
So I generally try to point out to such people the errors in their data,
along with the facts as I know them. This rarely results in a published
correction but at least I have tried. To try to get them to correct the
error of their ways as well is a task quite beyond me.
A very Happy Christmas and a Healthy, Happy and [hopefully] Prosperous
New Year to all in the Catley study group.
Chris
Tim Cattley <felis(a)mypostoffice.co.uk> writes
>I presume that I am not alone in being concerned by the errors to be
>found in other peoples attempts to record Cat*ley family trees that
>crop up on internet research sites?
>All too often I come across peoples work which has been made public but
>contains fundamental errors caused by assumption, speculation, or worse.
>
>It is interesting to note that in all instances the authors (in my
>case) are not Cat*ley tree members but way off members of other trees
>connected by marriage events which in many instances, took place less
>than 100 years ago but the authors see fit to chase back up each
>surname in a frantic effort to bag as many names as possible and then
>proudly post the results as multiple tree compilations, presumably on
>the grounds that "bigger is better" ?
>
>It is also obvious that many of these erroneous efforts are brought
>about by a certain amount of cribbing with classic (known) research
>mistakes being repeated and compounded. Had the authors done their own
>original research work, it is probable that such mistakes may have been
>avoided. In my case, there are numerous instances where would be
>genealogists have managed to merge two different Yorkshire Catley trees
>in to one by mistaken attachment of a Normanton tree male Catley with a
>Garforth tree female to create a hi-bred pseodo tree!
>
>It is very easy to take umbrage when seeing such errors taking the view
>"I am not having our tree misrepresented" and assume the role of
>policeman by making contact with the perpetrators and attempting to get
>them to make the necessory changes to get the genealogy correct.
>However such actions invite a considerable amount of time investment
>with no guarantee that the author will make adjustments not to mention
>the possibility that certain web sites do not seemingly offer the
>facility of modifying/editing information already contained.
>
>What are your views on the subject, does one leave things alone or
>attempt change?
>
>Tim
>
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--
Chris Newall EMail : chris(a)rebus.demon.co.uk
Ealing, London, W5 Website:
http://www.rebus.demon.co.uk/
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