Before we get into any controversy over the question in the title to this post, I believe the answer to be yes, collaborative shared information sites, like the FamilySearch Wiki or the family tree Website, Werelate.org, certainly have a large role to play in genealogical world of the near future. But, is genealogy really about consensus? Just because I can get all of relatives to agree with me where my great-grandfather was born in California, does that really change the fact that I may be wrong?
The issue is this, we can assume that in family history, there is always a set of "true" facts about a person. That is, those fact that correspond to the actual date or place where an event occurred. For example, a birth occurs only at one location and at one time. The date and location of the birth event are not subject to opinion, consensus or even a vote. To the extent that research genealogists deal in the facts about people's lives, can we rely on a vote or consensus from a person's descendants to establish historical facts?
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