Robert Dale McHenry (born April 30, 1945) is an American editor, encyclopedist, and writer. McHenry worked from 1967 for Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. or associated companies, becoming editor-in-chief of the Encyclopædia Britannica in 1992, a position he held until 1997. McHenry is also author of the book How to Know (2004), and a frequent contributor to journals. April 30 is the 120th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (121st in leap years), with 245 days remaining, as the last day in April. ... 1945 (MCMXLV) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1945 calendar). ... Editing is the process of preparing language, images, or sound for publication through correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications. ... The term encyclopedist is usually used for a group of French philosophers who collaborated in the 18th century in the production of the Encyclopédie, under the direction of Denis Diderot. ... The term writer can apply to anyone who creates a written work, but the word more usually designates those who write creatively or professionally, or those who have written in many different forms. ... Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. ... 1913 advertisement for the 11th edition, with the slogan When in doubt — look it up in the Encyclopædia Britannica The Encyclopædia Britannica (properly spelled with æ, the ae-ligature) was first published in 1768–1771 as The Britannica was an important early English-language general encyclopedia and is still... How to Know is a book by Robert McHenry. ...

Early life and education

McHenry was born in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. He attended Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1966. He also received a Master's degree from the University of Michigan in 1967. Later in life, McHenry undertook further study at Northwestern University, where he received a Master of Business Administration in 1987.^[1] Nickname: Gateway City, Gateway to the West, or Mound City Official website: http://stlouis. ... Northwestern University is a private, coeducational, non-sectarian university, located in Evanston, Illinois and Chicago, Illinois. ... Nickname: The Windy City Motto: Urbs In Horto (Latin: City in a Garden), I Will Official website: http://egov. ... A Bachelor of Arts (B.A. or A.B., from the Latin Artium Baccalaureus) is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for a course or program in the arts and/or sciences. ... A masters degree is an academic degree usually awarded for completion of a postgraduate or graduate course of one to three years in duration. ... This article is about the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. ... Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a tertiary degree in business management. ...

Editorial career

McHenry's career at Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. began in 1967. After two years, he transferred to San Francisco Productions to work for Mortimer Adler, where he co-edited (with Charles Van Doren) Webster's Guide to American History, A Documentary History of Conservation in America, and Webster's American Biographies. McHenry transferred in 1975 to G. & C. Merriam Co. (later renamed Merriam-Webster Inc.) where he edited Webster's American Military Biographies, Famous American Women, Liberty's Women, and Webster's New Biographical Dictionary.^[2][1][3] Mortimer Adler around 1963 Mortimer Jerome Adler (December 28, 1902 – June 28, 2001) was an American philosopher and author. ... Charles Lincoln Van Doren (born February 12, 1926) is an American intellectual and former TV quiz show contestant. ... Merriam-Webster, originally known as the G. & C. Merriam Company of Springfield, Massachusetts, is a United States company that publishes reference books, especially dictionaries that are descendants of Noah Websters An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828). ...

McHenry returned to Britannica in 1982 as editor of Compton's Yearbook, which was an annual supplement to Compton's Encyclopedia. McHenry later joined the editorial staff of the Encyclopædia Britannica, initially as director of Britannica yearbooks, later progressing to become managing editor of the encyclopedia itself in 1986, general editor in 1990, and editor-in-chief in 1992.^[1] Comptons Encyclopedia and Fact-Index is the title of an encyclopedia published in Chicago, Illinois since the 1920s. ...

McHenry played a key role in the launch in 1994 of the Encyclopædia Britannica in two electronic forms; a CD-ROM version, Britannica CD, and an Internet version, Britannica Online, which was the first Internet-based encyclopedia.^[1] The CD-ROM (an abbreviation for Compact Disc Read-Only Memory (ROM)) is a non-volatile optical data storage medium using the same physical format as audio compact discs, readable by a computer with a CD-ROM drive. ...

McHenry believes that Britannica failed to exploit its early advantages in the market for electronic encyclopedias. Britannica had, for example, published the first multimedia encyclopedia (Compton's MultiMedia Encyclopedia) as early as 1989, but did not launch Britannica CD until 1994, one year after Microsoft launched their Encarta encyclopedia. McHenry believes these failures were due to a reluctance amongst senior management to fully embrace new technology, caused largely by the overriding influence of the sales staff and management. The sales personnel earned commissions from door-to-door selling of the print encyclopedias, which McHenry believes led to decisions about the distribution and pricing of the electronic products, being driven by the desires of the sales personnel, rather than market conditions and customer expectations.^[4] Multimedia is the use of several different media (e. ... Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT, SEHK: 4338) is an international computer technology corporation with 2005 global annual sales of close to $40 billion USD and about 64,000 employees in 85 countries and regions which develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of software products for computing devices. ... Encarta is a digital multimedia encyclopedia published by Microsoft Corporation. ...

Aided by Britannica's failings, Microsoft took a dominant position in the market for CD-ROM encyclopedias in the 1990s. McHenry had little respect for their achievement, which he believed to be the result of, not only large resources and wide market reach, but a "casual disregard for quality work".^[4] In particular, in an article in 1996 (which the senior management at Britannica refused permission to publish) McHenry criticised Microsoft for its policy of having factually different versions of the same article in the various national issues of the encyclopedia. McHenry regarded this practice as "pandering to local prejudices" in order to suit local markets, instead of presenting subjects objectively.^[5]

McHenry stood down as the editor-in-chief of the Encyclopædia Britannica in 1997.^[1]

Life after Britannica

In 1998, McHenry wrote the book How to Know, in which he explored the questions of what we can know and how we know that we know it. Though written in 1998, the book was not published until 2004.^[6]

During 2002 and 2003, McHenry worked part time in a used-book store,^[7][8] and for a company producing Internet content-filtering software.^[9] During the same period, McHenry had several articles published in the The Chronicle of Higher Education and The Vocabula Review.^[10] The articles were mainly about low standards in writing and verbal communication. One exception was a defence of Oprah's Book Club, following hostile comments from some critics.^[11] DansGuardian censoring Whitehouse. ... The Chronicle of Higher Education is a newspaper that is a source of news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty and administration. ... The Vocabula Review is an electronic journal about the state of the English language. ... Oprahs Book Club is a book club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. ...

In November 2004, McHenry began writing for the online journal Tech Central Station (later renamed TCS Daily).^[10] McHenry's first article for TCS Daily was criticism of Wikipedia. In essence, McHenry's main criticism was that Wikipedia was operating on what he believed was a false premise; that allowing anyone to edit articles, whether or not they were knowledgeable, would lead to evolution of article quality. Belief in the ability of Wikipedia to succeed, he argued, required a faith that "some unspecified quasi-Darwinian process will assure that those writings and editings by contributors of greatest expertise will survive". A secondary criticism was that editors were being self-indulgent, because editors spent time on minor alterations, while leaving important factual inaccuracies in place.^[12] In a later article about Wikipedia, following the Seigenthaler controversy, McHenry restated his earlier objections, and added a criticism that the Wikipedia organisation had been unable to respond adequately to the event.^[13] Tech Central Station (TCS) describes itself as a website where free markets meet technology. Since late 2005, the website has appeared under the title of TCS Daily, a publication of Tech Central Station. ... John Seigenthaler Sr. ...

McHenry's articles about Wikipedia have produced responses from other writers. In a response to McHenry's first article, Aaron Krowne considered McHenry's article to be an attack on the credibility of the commons-based peer production, for which there was already strong evidence of success.^[14] In a response to McHenry's later article, Tim Worstall, a fellow contributor to TCS Daily, argued that McHenry was assuming that the editorial process of traditional encyclopedias was effective in preventing inaccuracies. Worstall, drawing on his own experience as a contributor to traditional encyclopedias, argued that the editorial process often fails, because human nature leads editors to take the easy option of consulting other secondary sources, rather than take the extra effort to check primary sources.^[15] McHenry published responses to both of these articles, but in neither case did he challenge the arguments made.^[16][17] Commons-based peer production is a term coined by professor Yochai Benkler to describe a new model of economic production, different from both markets and firms, in which the creative energy of large numbers of people gets coordinated (usually with the aid of the internet) into large, meaningful projects, largely... Secondary sources are texts based on primary sources, and involve generalization, analysis, synthesis, interpretation, or evaluation. ... A primary source is any piece of information that is used for constructing history as an artifact of its times. ...

McHenry has criticised Intelligent Design (ID) on several occasions. McHenry argued that ID is not a theory in the scientific meaning of the word, because it is not based on evidence, it does not generate predictions, and thus cannot be tested.^[18] He described ID as anti-science, because it begins with conclusion, that some unknown things are unknowable, and then is supported by selected evidence.^[19] McHenry argued that science is the engine of society and the root of economic success. He believes that ID supporters want to stop the engine, not just for themselves, but for everyone else. He views the support of politicians for ID as particularly dangerous.^[20] Intelligent design (ID) is the concept that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. ...

McHenry's articles are normally critical in nature, though there is a humourous side to McHenry. One example was an article about his thoughts of the possible meanings of a "No deadly weapons in building" sign he had seen outside a public library.^[21] Another example was an article where he weighed up the pros and cons of a suggestion that candidates for the United States Congress be selected by lot, but every apparent con became a pro after further consideration.^[22] Congress in Joint Session. ...

References

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Robert McHenry. Encyclopædia Britannica. URL accessed on 2006-01-03.
2. ↑ Find in a Library: Webster's guide to American history. WorldCat. URL accessed on 2006-02-18.
3. ↑ Find in a Library: Famous American women. WorldCat. URL accessed on 2006-02-18.
4. ↑ ^a b The Building of Britannica Online. howtoknow.com. URL accessed on 2005-12-30.
5. ↑ The Microsoft Way. howtoknow.com. URL accessed on 2005-12-18.
6. ↑ McHenry, Robert (2004). How to Know, Booklocker.com. ISBN 1591135230.
7. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "If Vonnegut is Literature, What is Jacqueline Susann?", The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2002-04-05.
8. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "Shoptalk", The Vocabula Review, August 2002.
9. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "Pornographorhea", The Vocabula Review, July 2003.
10. ↑ ^a b Published articles. howtoknow.com. URL accessed on 2005-12-28.
11. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "All Hail Oprah's Book Club", The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2002-05-10.
12. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "The Faith-Based Encyclopedia", TCS Daily, 2004-11-15.
13. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "The Faith-Based Encyclopedia Blinks", TCS Daily, 2005-12-14.
14. ↑ Krowne, Aaron, "The FUD-based Encyclopedia", Free Software Magazine, March 2005.
15. ↑ Worstall, Tim, "The Scribe's Problem", TCS Daily, 2005-12-22.
16. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "The FUD-based Encyclopedia", LWN.net, 2005-02-28.
17. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "The Scribe's Problem Child", TCS Daily, 2006-01-03.
18. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "Intelligent Decline", TCS Daily, 2005-05-19.
19. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "We Are Living in a Material World...", TCS Daily, 2005-06-01.
20. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "Turning 'Unknown' into 'Unknowable'", TCS Daily, 2005-08-10.
21. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "One Man's 'Deadly Weapon'...", TCS Daily, 2005-06-29.
22. ↑ McHenry, Robert, "A Congress of Your Peers", TCS Daily, 2006-01-11.

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External links

• Photograph of Robert McHenry, from The Vocabula Review
• howtoknow.com, Robert McHenry's website
• TCS Daily, an online journal that Robert McHenry writes for regularly