Evaluation of General Sources

The backbone of every research project or any informed writing at all is the collection of sources that the writer uses as information to write. In the following post, I will go into more detail about a select two of my sources that I will be using for this project.

Condesign. "Books, Book Pages, Read, Literature, Browse, Light."  12/08/2015 via Pixabay. Public Domain License

"Physician Assisted Death"

• The URL for this particular website ends in ".org." This suggests that the company who runs the website is some sort of organization or non-profit, but it doesn't necessarily mean that, as anyone can purchase a ".org." Although, as a general rule, this usually means that a site is more credible, because anyone can purchase a ".org" it doesn't make it the best way to determine a site's credibility. 

• The authors of the article are Timothy E. Quill, M.D., and Jane Greenlaw, R.N. The article gives contact info and short biographies about each of the authors, that show their accomplishments, educations, and their places of work. 

• The article was last updated in January of 2016 with new information regarding the topic. There are links to related articles, other websites with information on the topic in the article, and to a timeline of the events that are discussed in the article. All of the links are working, and most of them take you to websites with supplemental information, or to other pages on this particular website.  

• This text is very informative and educational regarding the topic of physician assisted suicide. It's very objective and does not seem to be trying to convince the reader of anything, but to inform them more about the topic.

• There is one graphic that illustrates a timeline of legal events regarding the issue at hand because this issue is one that involves the law and legislation very heavily. 

• This source seems to be very unbiased and very objective. The information is very thorough and contains perspectives from both sides of the argument. At the end of the article there is a list of sources that you could check their information against if you wanted to. I have also found throughout my research that this article has much of the same information that other articles have, leading me to believe that it is true information.

• As I mentioned before, the article does have links to other information in the article. It also has a list of sources, both print and online, that you could use to do more research if you choose. 

"Debate: Should Physician Assisted Suicide be Legal?"

• The URL for this website ends in ".org" which leads me to believe that the website is trustworthy. It is also published by NPR which leads me to believe that the information is true, as the reputation of such a large company rests on it.

Esrever. "National Public Radio Logo" 12/01/2007 via Wikimedia Commons. Public Domain license 

• Because this particular source is actually a podcast that is found on the website, there is no particular author, however it lists the people who take part in the podcast. There is a list of the participants (Peter Singer, Andrew Solomon, Baroness Ilora Finlay, and Dr. Daniel Sulmasy) and a small summary about who they are: their credentials, a small biography, and their accomplishments. 

• The NPR website is updated every hour at a minimum with their hourly news. You can determine if the material is out of date by looking at the date that the particular article was published. There are links to other recent articles on the page. 

• The purpose of this web source is to inform the listener about a debate that is happening about a controversial topic. Because the format is a debate, it could be inferred that each side of the debate is trying to persuade the listener to take their side. 

• There are graphics in the description of the podcast. There are pictures of the participants of the debate. The pictures are there probably to give the listener an idea of how the debate was set up and who exactly is participating. 

• The source itself is unbiased regarding the topic, but the participants in the debate obviously have their own bias. This source shows both sides of the argument, however, so that a person can form their opinion based on viewing both sides of the argument. 

• At the bottom of the webpage there are links so that you can read more articles about the topic by searching for posts that are tagged similarly. There are no sources cited for the debate, however you can see the credentials of the people who are in the debate, and throughout the article, they reference sources of information, which can also be seen in the transcript of the debate.