Talk:Paederus

A fact from Paederus appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 10 August 2011 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that tiny Paederus beetles (pictured) may have caused some of the ten Plagues of Egypt?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2011/August. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template talk:Did you know/Paederus.

Wikipedia

Insects Low‑importance

	Insects portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Insects, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of insects on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.InsectsWikipedia:WikiProject InsectsTemplate:WikiProject InsectsInsects articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Beetles Mid‑importance

	Insects portal Paederus is within the scope of WikiProject Beetles, an attempt to better organize information in articles related to beetles. For more information, visit the project page.BeetlesWikipedia:WikiProject BeetlesTemplate:WikiProject Beetlesbeetle articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

Tip: Anchors are case-sensitive in most browsers.

This article links to one or more target anchors that no longer exist.

[[Plagues of Egypt#6. Plague of boils .28.D7.A9.D6.B0.D7.81.D7.97.D6.B4.D7.99.D7.9F.29: Ex. 9:8.E2.80.9312|plague of "boils"]]

Please help fix the broken anchors. You can remove this template after fixing the problems. | Reporting errors

Blister beetles and the ten plagues??

Blister beetles and the ten plagues

Really?! What archaeological or independent historical attestation do they have that the ten plagues were a real event, and not just a mythic/moralic symbol for a more profound religious truth, that cannot be interpreted scientifically. I don't think science, religion, nor wikipedia profits from repeating this kind of pseudoscientific crap. Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 18:36, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

First, these are not blister beetles, they are rove beetles. Second, it would be quite a WP:COATRACK digression for this article to get into a scientific debate with the authors of a scientific paper in Lancet, whose point is that public misfortunes similar to those described in Exodus could have been caused by Paederus. Anybody who clicks the wikilink from this article to ten plagues of Egypt can read there enormous skepticism about who did what to whom way back when and etc.

Sharktopus

^talk 18:59, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is yet another example of why many people ridicule WP and don't consider it a reliable source. Dr. Morbius (talk) 19:57, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As I said, check out ten plagues of Egypt for skeptical discussion, one that has little to do with Paederus beetles.

Sharktopus

^talk 21:21, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]