PhilWiki is an open reference encyclopedia of philosophy, written for clarity and organized for study. This page sets out who maintains it, how entries are made, and the standards they are held to.

The project

PhilWiki collects reference entries on the branches, figures, and arguments of philosophy. Each entry is written to take a reader from a working definition to the surrounding debate without assuming prior training, and to do so without settling questions that the field leaves open. Where a topic is contested, an entry names the positions and the considerations on each side rather than declaring a winner.

The aim is a resource that is useful at the start of study and still accurate enough to return to later. Entries are free to read, structured with a table of contents, and supported by citations to primary texts and established scholarly references.

Who maintains it

PhilWiki is maintained by its editorial team, an organization rather than a single named author. Entries are published under the team’s collective byline because they are the product of drafting, review, and revision by more than one contributor and are intended to be maintained over time rather than fixed to one person’s name.

We do not invent author personas, credentials, or photographs. Where an entry summarizes the work of a philosopher or scholar, that person is named in the text and listed among the cited sources; the editorial team takes responsibility for the summary, not for the original scholarship.

Editorial standards

Every entry is held to the same standards before publication:

• Claims about a thinker’s views are checked against the primary text or a recognized scholarly account of it.
• Contested questions are presented as contested, with the main positions named.
• Technical terms are defined where they first carry weight, and footnotes record qualifications that would otherwise interrupt the reading.
• Entries avoid promotional language and superlatives; the tone is explanatory and restrained.
• Each published entry is read and approved by a member of the editorial team.

Use of AI assistance

We use AI tools to assist with drafting and copy-editing, and we say so plainly on every entry. Assistance means a first draft, a restructuring suggestion, or a check on clarity; it does not mean unsupervised publication. No entry appears on PhilWiki without a human editor reviewing it against sources and approving it.

We disclose this because readers deserve to know how the text in front of them was made. The byline on each entry reads “drafted with AI assistance under human editorial review,” and that statement is meant literally: the editorial team, not a language model, is accountable for what the entry says.

Sources and citation

Entries cite the works they rely on. Wherever a standard reference exists, such as a primary text or an article in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, it is listed so that readers can check the entry and read further. Footnotes carry the qualifications and pointers that belong to careful reading but would clutter the main text.

How to cite

Because entries are revised, a citation should record the entry title, the site, and the date you consulted it. A typical reference reads: PhilWiki Editorial Team, “Entry Title,” PhilWiki, accessed on the relevant date. The revision date shown in each entry’s byline identifies the version you are reading.

Corrections

Reference work is never finished. If you find an error, an outdated citation, or an unclear passage, we want to correct it; entries are updated as the literature and our reading of it improve, and the revision date reflects the most recent change.

Philosophy is a living discipline, and the academic profession around it continues to change. For news and discussion of that profession, readers may consult Daily Nous, a long-running source on the philosophy community. PhilWiki is an independent reference and is not affiliated with it.