Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1958 in List of years in paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience

Add links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete the list, but userfy the single pages, which as far as I see has already been done. (If something is missing, I'll restore it on request). I'll also delete the category, since as there is consensus to empty it for now. If in future pages for single years are barnched out, they should probably be named differently, e.g. 1947 in paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience. Tikiwont (talk) 11:20, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

1958 in List of years in paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience[edit]

1958 in List of years in paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

Also included in this nomination:

Non-notable list. Fails WP:NOT and WP:LIST for indiscriminate lists. Information like this should be listed in the articles on the paranormal phenomenon. They don't merit a year by year list of their own. Redfarmer (talk) 18:12, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment Are you going to list the other articles in Category:Years in paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience? Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 18:20, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    •  Done Yes, it's just taking me a minute because real life chimed in (I had to put dinner in the microwave). Redfarmer (talk) 18:21, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I vote keep, obviously. I don't see why not. If you make a series of articles on the subject, you can give it a more thorough treatment. Individual articles can only hold so many individual sightings before becoming so cluttered as to be unreadable. The timeline series also allows readers to get a better historic perspective by seeing how different phenomena line up, when important figures were born, when certain theories happened, when things were revealed to be hoaxes, etc, etc. I think this chronological "time line" of articles would be extremely enlightening for anyone with an interest in the subject.Abyssal leviathin (talk) 18:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We haven't had time to add to the article, so how can you say that there wouldn't be enough information already? It's not like this thing was stagnant for months, I had created it only minutes before you tried to have it deleted. With so many cryptids, paranormal phenomena, researchers, creatures of folklore, pseudoscientific movements, debunkings, etc, there's plenty of stuff to fill a timeline. It may take a while to do so, but you haven't even given it a chance. Abyssal leviathin (talk) 19:08, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I said little potential for growth here. Are you saying you have enough information to fill every year from 1600 to 2008 like the lead article suggests? Will you have enough secondary sources to justify separate yearly articles for each year or can they more easily be featured in articles on the subject? Redfarmer (talk) 19:18, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Probably not from 1600 to 2008. But, if there's a century where nothing of relevence happened in, it can be removed from the list page. I never intended to keep all those centuries on the page. But yes, I'm reasonably confident that there's enough information out there to construct a year-by-year timeline of reasonably good quality, at least pertinent to recent times. Abyssal leviathin (talk) 19:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You could throw that objection at any timeline about a general category of knowledge. Would you object to a "Years in history" article series too? I imagine an article like that would contain quite the hodge podge of topics, most of which probably less related than the ones in this series. What about "Years in science"? Just what is the "context" of science anyway?
And your accusation that this is somehow original research is a joke. There's nothing original about it, it's all going to be verifiable information, just like any other Wikipedia article would be. And the implication that this would be an attempt to "advance a position" as the "synthesis" section you linked to says, shows that you haven't been paying attenion. I've said from the beginning that this series would cover both claims, debunkings and revelations of hoaxes. That's about as NPOV as you can get.
Sorry if I seem testy, I just really think this article series could turn out well if given a chance.
Abyssal leviathin (talk) 23:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all All of these could be grouped into a single article about "B-- F---", without the conceit of setting aside an entire year as special. For each year mentioned, there's one thing that's mentioned. Summaries: 1840-- Rev. Walker looked for Bigfoot. 1947-Roswell, of course. That's all. 1958- construction workers see Bigfoot. 1967-film of Bigfoot. 1970-A psychiatrist sees what he calls zoobies. 1995-a TV crew films Bigfoot. Even 2006 and 2007, which you'd think would be filled with every strange story someone saw on the internet, each have one item about...Bigfoot. Except for 1947 (Bigfoot was on a sabattical in Europe at that time), it's all about Sasquatch. Wikipedia isn't the Fortean Times. The intent seems to be that every time a UFO or a Bigfoot or another strange this is observed, someone will create an article called "19__ in y.i.p.f.a.p." and then someone else will add to it. Save it for Yetipedia. Mandsford (talk) 23:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Um, no crap all it talks about is Bigfoot. That's all that I had time to add before you guys started hounding for it to be deleted! Seriously. The vast majority of the criticisms the articles in question have received indirectly come from the fact that people have been hounding for it to be deleted before it had the chance to develop at all.
First they tried to delete the list of years itself saying "It's a list of links to non-existant pages," which of course was irritating, as the page had been up for less than five minutes! How many articles was I supposed to create in that time? Then, to satisfy that guy I scramble for three or four minutes trying to create as many articles as possible. And then, I get swarmed by people telling me that they should all be deleted because of how undeveloped they were! How many well developed articles could you create in that amount of time?
And the tone of your writing at the end seems to point to your wanting to delete this is somewhat based on a distaste for the subject matter. That's not a good reason to delete them.
So here's all the criticisms, we've got, implied or otherwise:
  1. No articles made in the series (how many should I have made within 5 minutes?)
  2. Too narrow a subject matter for a timeline (not true)
  3. Too broad a subject matter for a single timeline (contradictory much?)
  4. It's a synthesis with original research (Not true. At all.)
  5. I'm advancing an agenda with a synthesis (I said from the beginning I was covering both sides of the issue. And I didn't refer to the subjects as fringe and pseudoscience because I considered them legitimate!)
  6. Content is only about Bigfoot (because it was nominated fr deletion before I could add anything else!)
  7. The paranormal is stupid (Personal opinion, not grounds for deletion)
Does anyone have any legitimate reason why this should be deleted? Didn't think so.
Abyssal leviathin (talk) 00:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We can only judge the articles based on what is there. IMO, an article shouldn't be in article space unless it is ready to pass Wikipedia guidelines. Besides, if you have an intention of improving the articles, you could still be doing that; nothing about AfD prevents you from doing that. I checked your contribs and you have only been editing articles on plants since the AfD started. I still need to be able to see how this would improve knowledge on psuedoscience any more than individual articles on, say, Roswell or Bigfoot would. Redfarmer (talk) 01:13, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure what you're talking about with the plant thing, but I do see your point. However, I hope you can understand why I'd be reluctant to invest much effort into improving an article while it has a lynch mob trying to delete it. I'd love to do so, though. I've been looking forward to creating this for a long time. I'm gonna take a few hour break though, been on Wiki like all day. :D Abyssal leviathin (talk) 01:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Restructure I think the idea is good, but could need a wholly different format. Benjaminbruheim (talk) 00:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all per nom. Masterpiece2000 (talk) 10:44, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy It looks to me like the creator was being chased through these articles by a hasty AFD... If the pages were userfied, then the creator could complete the pages before releasing them into the wild. I think they would be useful, complete, but not as is. MorganaFiolett (talk) 14:41, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • My 2p Worth I'd endorse MorganaFiolett's userfy suggestion, or a merge all. I think the problem, here, is that the creator has come at this problem the wrong way around, by trying to create a structure before there is any material. And the problem with that is that you've now got 408 useless articles (&/or spaces where articles belong) which frankly will be impossible to make useful in any reasonable timescale. The better approach would be to start with a Timeline of...-type article, then to expand it from reliable sources until it gets big enough for the centuries to need breaking-out per summary style, then to expand those until the decades need breaking out, and so-forth. If that process takes many years to complete, or is never completed, it will not matter because the only articles created along the way will have been good-quality ones. AndyJones (talk) 17:57, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'd endorse this too, as I think this is essentially what I was trying to get through to him (you just put it much more eloquently than me). I'm not opposed to the idea per se but it's a ridiculous task to start with five centuries worth of years and go year for year. This becomes a navigation nightmare and does not increase knowledge. No prejudice to recreate the way MorganaFiolett and AndyJones have suggested. Redfarmer (talk) 20:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • Alright, I can go for that. :D Abyssal leviathin (talk) 20:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • I guess the starting point is to create the timeline article. Once that's in place we can redirect all of these to it, then propose a speedy close of this AfD. Let me know if you want any help with the practicalities of that. Have you thought about the name? "paranormal, fringe, and pseudoscience" is a bit clunky, but I'm afraid I don't have a pithier suggestion. AndyJones (talk) 20:42, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge all per above. Mgiganteus1 (talk) 21:13, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/1958_in_List_of_years_in_paranormal,_fringe,_and_pseudoscience&oldid=1070556288"