why are totally wrong answers (contrary to established facts) posted in yahoo answers and voted 'best'?

Becasue this is a social stite and peoples opinions weigh more then fact. In fact the sites quoted are often wrong or misleading.

Just becase it is on a website does not make it true. And just becase it is on a well known website (I will pick on wikipedia), does not make it true either. Even scientific fact is often challenenged and later found out to be false.

As for when kindergardenstarted look at Goethe's teachings and the Prussian school system. You are correct, it predates 1964 by more then a century.

Read the bottom of the YA pages:

"Yahoo! does not evaluate or guarantee the accuracy of any Yahoo! Answers content."

This is a public access site where everybody and ANYbody can and does answer. Best Answers are chosen by the asker (with personal prejudice) OR by voters (with their own agendas, usually just getting points for voting). Nothing was EVER said about accuracy or truth on this site.

Maybe, out of the answers given, that WAS the best of the list.

By the way, in the US, it was not decades before -- it was over a century before:

http://www.doj.state.wi.us/kidspage/fun_facts/kind...

"Margarethe Meyer Schurz started the first kindergarten in the United States in Watertown in 1856. "

And even earlier in other parts of the world:

http://www.faqs.org/childhood/Ke-Me/Kindergarten.h...

"In 1837 Froebel opened the first kindergarten in Blankenburg, Germany. "

Sometimes it's deliberate, and then other times the person who asked the question may not know the information is incorrect. We are told from the very beginning that Y!A can not guarantee the validity of all answers. And sometimes the information given is well intended. Y!A has no control over what answers are given, or chosen (or voted) as Best Answer.

Perhaps the asker picked best answer - and picked the answer they agreed with rather than the factual answer which may not have supported their wacko theory. YA doesn't check the accuracy of the answers. It is a public forum. People can say almost anything.

Also - maybe the asker and answerer lived in a state that did not have kindergarden until 1964. I lived in quite a few places growing up, and not all of them had kindergarden.

Because it's a site mainly populated by 13 year olds trying to get numbers for the Jonas brothers and cheating on their homework, I really seriously doubt the integrity of their answers are a priority to this lot.

"A friend said it's people deliberately distributing misinformation to support their wacko ideas"

Well that sounds like a 'wacko idea' itself...

Not really. I seem to find that many questions are almost all the same questions are being asked over & over again. Mostly on the Singles & Dating category. The only questions I am asking or answering are unique questions that has been asked rarely or no one has ask at all. I would submit a common question but only if its a last resort. Nowadays, I am looking for unique questions to answer or ask. I guess some people feel the same way & that's why less people come here & participate.

I don't know, but I started kindergarten in 1970, and I had to go to a private one. Public schools didn't offer kindergarten in my state at the time. Nor did they a few years later when my little sister started going.

Because that's exactly how the voting process works.

It doesn't matter who is right, it only matters how many people agreed with them.

And since people (in a collective sense) are idiots, you sometimes get the wrong answer as the 'right' one.

if it was voted as best, then the person that provided that answer probably voted for himself. if it was chosen as best, then maybe it was the best answer out of the ones provided, OR had the most information (even if it was wrong), OR was the one the asker liked the best. yahoo! answers is not a science.

Because most times the first answer is voted the best regardless of information.