Wikipedia talk:Primary and secondary source paradoxes in law-related articles

	This page is within the scope of WikiProject Wikipedia essays, a collaborative effort to organize and monitor the impact of Wikipedia essays. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion. For a listing of essays see the essay directory.Wikipedia essaysWikipedia:WikiProject Wikipedia essaysTemplate:WikiProject Wikipedia essaysWikiProject Wikipedia essays pages
Low	This page has been rated as Low-impact on the project's impact scale.
	The above rating was automatically assessed using data on pageviews, watchers, and incoming links.

Paradox

I do not see the paradox. Secondary sources are not more reliable or neutral than primary sources. We use them because we are not supposed to determine what is noteworthy in primary sources or to interpret them. TFD (talk) 20:56, 1 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One paradox is that a voice, its recording, the transcript of the recording, a newspaper reporter taking notes from the transcript, and a newspaper report of the notes, are not possibly categorizable into only two kinds of sources, primary and secondary. Another is that a court transcript and a newspaper quote are identical in logical form, but at WIkipedia, one is a primary source, and the other a secondary source. PPdd (talk) 21:23, 1 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

A transcript, wherever published remains a primary source, because "whether a source is primary or secondary depends on context". An article about a trial may be used as a secondary source for its interpretation of testimony, but as a primary source for its verbatim reporting of testimony. TFD (talk)

This esasy should never have been set upin the first place and should be moved to the users own space. It seems to be just based on a misunderstanding that secondary sources are supposed to be more accurate. Secondary sources provide notability but primary sources may be better for the straight facts. There's problems enough with primary secondary and tertiary butt would have been better to just ask at the noticeboard in the first place about this interpretation. Dmcq (talk) 01:21, 2 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

+1--Kmhkmh (talk) 14:25, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk^(P) 09:13, 7 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Simply wrong

"The statement of the case in an appeal brief is a secondary source on the trial. It is also a reliable source." Describing trial or appellate briefs as RS is simply wrong. These are not WP:Published. – S. Rich (talk) 15:53, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]