Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Coherent catastrophism (2nd nomination)

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. There were suggestions to merge this into catastrophism , but I don't see sufficient support for that to include it in the consensus. -- RoySmith (talk) 16:04, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Coherent catastrophism[edit]

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I see no improvement since the first AfD and no major difference in terms of sources actually discussing the subject, which most of the sources fail to do. Doug Weller talk 11:48, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at the sources, the first two are its main proponents, Cube and Napier. The statement "That coherent catastrophism affects Earth is broadly accepted as fact within the cometary science community" is sourced but there is no page number and the source only mentions it once, as a suggestion for further reading on page 235.[1] The next bit of that sentence says the debate has moved on but I see no debate, just more articles by Cube and Napier. We then have "Exceptions include research groupings associated with the Younger Dryas impact hypothesis,[7] Burckle crater,[8] and Gobekli Tepe". Working backwards, the "research grouping" for Gobekli Tepe is no such thing, it is an article by a professor of chemical engineering and a graduate student. Peer reviewed, yes, but according to User:Joe Roe published in a very minor journal which normally doesn't deal with this sort of paper. The Buckle Crater "research group" source is a conference presentation and however impressive its authors may be you can download it (link on the right of this page[2] and search it - you won't find the word "coherent", let alone "coherent catastrophe". The Firestone paper on the Younger Dryas impact hypothesis[3] also fails to mention "coherent" or "coherent catastrophe". The section on mechanism is sourced mainly to Cube and Napier, and I haven't yet checked the other sources to see if they mention the subject. Finally, the last section starts "The current epoch of coherent catastrophism is thought to be caused by.." Again, the sources[4] [5] don't mention the subject.

So basically this article seems no different except for the addition of a lot of WP:Synthesis. Doug Weller talk 12:04, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Astronomy-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 12:09, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy Delete. This looks like a recreation of a deleted content and therefore should be subject to G4. I am going merely by memory though as I'm not an admin and cannot see the deleted content. Same arguments apply as last time. jps (talk) 12:11, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy delete, per jps. Sławomir Biały (talk) 12:20, 28 July 2017 (UTC) The procedural conditions for a speedy outcome are no longer satisfied. I have no opinion on the current content, so I will refrain from offering an opinion, except to say that I apparently found this to be convincing at the time. But it seems like there is a greater depth of opinion this time around that at least deserves a hearing. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:23, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:NFRINGE. As Doug says, the only coverage the article cites is papers by its proponents and other fringe authors. I can't find any independent coverage of it in reliable secondary sources. Perhaps merits a brief mention in catastrophism but that's it. – Joe (talk) 12:30, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I changed my mind since the last debate. I'm also the one that curated the new article. Nothing in WP:FRINGE says that notable minority theories shouldn't have articles, suitable written with care to sources and POV. The previous article was written by an advocate, this one is apparently written by a less involved editor. Some secondary/tertiary sources to consider: Impact!: The Threat of Comets and Asteroids 1997 Gerrit Verschuur; Controversy Catastrophism and Evolution: The Ongoing Debate 2012 Trevor Palmer; Physical Geography: The Key Concepts 2009 Richard Huggett. There are dozens more books at least mentioning this term, quite a number that discuss it in detail. A quick browse also shows up a number of academic papers by authors other than the obvious four, not necessarily advocating the concept but discussing it. Lithopsian (talk) 13:13, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
- Question @Lithopsian: what do you think of the issues that I've raised with the article itself? Statements not backed by sources discussing the subject? Doug Weller talk 14:07, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  - To be honest, I didn't pay too much attention. If an article on a notable subject is poorly written or poorly sourced then it should be improved, not deleted. Only in extreme cases would I vote to just delete an article on a subject that we would otherwise want. So I looked at the literature independently of the article, actually when I was curating not when this AfD came up. Lithopsian (talk) 14:47, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    - @Lithopsian: How about a merge and redirect to catastrophism? The sources you point out do not strike me as in-depth enough to allow for a full article. jps (talk) 12:13, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. – Joe (talk) 12:31, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Archaeology-related deletion discussions. – Joe (talk) 12:31, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy delete per G4. Though restated, I don't see anything new in the article. --regentspark (comment) 13:13, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Keep As the author of this article I will of course vote to keep. but I am unsure if this is a democracy. Going through all the comments individually will take some time, so I'll try to summarize. The main objection appears to be the lack of independent sources that discuss this subject. As Lithospian has already pointed out, there are numerous books that discuss it, and I will endeavour to find them and update where appropriate. Being closer to the research, I was intent on initially providing the primary research sources. The next issue, again, is that the work by Sweatman and Tsikritsis doesn't count, as they are engineers. This is a baseless criticism, and quite frankly, insulting to them. I am sure they are fine researchers. Joe Roe's opinion on the matter is of much less value than a peer-reviewed research article by professional scientists. Yes, the Burckle Crater source is a conference proceeding. As a scientists myself I am 'programmed' to always use the earliest source. I can update that with more authoritative peer-reviewed papers and other articles. The Holocene Impact Working Group is a respectable scientific grouping with many papers, as a quick search will reveal. I will endeavour to find ones that actually refer to CC directly. Yes, again, I chose the earliest paper about the YD impact hypothesis - this paper is now cited over 400 times, with many references to CC within that body of work. Again, I will endeavour to find the most pertinent ones. Regarding the 'Mechanism' section, again, these are primary sources. If you know the subject you will realise the papers by Napier here are treating the subject directly - they are providing the mechanism. He might not use the term himself in these papers, but what he is doing here is showing how CC can occur. The articles by Ipatov also cited are probably what you would call Synthesis - I was using them as they also show how giant comets can be trapped by the inner solar system, but they don't mention CC directly. I'll remove them. Joe suggests deletion on the basis that the authors of the papers cited are all fringe. I'd like to know what Joe's definition of Fringe is? These are all highly respected journals, and well-respected researchers in their academic communities. The papers are highly cited in the main. The issue of whether CC should be moved to a sub-section of catastrophism is the only real debate here. Given its importance I would say it deserves its own page. CC has around 1000 hits via Google - is that considered enough? I am sure that hit count will grow rapidly if the article is kept. The other editors haven't said anything except 'see previous decision - G4' whatever that means. Finally, I'd like to remind the editors that Wikipedia is, by a distance, the most frequently used online encyclopedia. An issue as important as this one should not be treated lightly, and the outputs of its research community should not just be dismissed without even reading them. Yes, they are controversial - but that is how good science proceeds. The public expects this kind of important topic to be represented on Wikipedia. As I said, I'll update the references to include more secondary ones - as a practising scientist I am programmed to always cite the earliest primary reference.WikiNeedsEditing (talk) 15:00, 28 July 2017 (UTC)WikiNeedsEditing[reply]

Not a comment on the topic but do note that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a journal. "Good science" "proceeds" in scientific journals and only shows up on Wikipedia when it is validated or discussed by reliable secondary sources. Thus, for example, we don't report findings directly from peer reviewed journal articles (that's the good science part) but rather from other papers that comment on the findings of an article. Find sufficient reliable secondary sources that talk about Coherent catastrophism, and in enough detail and with enough indication of the importance of the topic for a stand alone article rather than a mention somewhere else, and you won't have a problem. --regentspark (comment) 15:12, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Comment @WikiNeedsEditing: This is more of a weighing of the arguments then a vote, in fact we call the keep and delete statements !votes. The issue is does this subject meet the criteria at Wikipedia:Notability. Read the "General notability guideline" section. In particular, ""Sources"[2] should be secondary sources, as those provide the most objective evidence of notability. There is no fixed number of sources required since sources vary in quality and depth of coverage, but multiple sources are generally expected.[3] Sources do not have to be available online or written in English. Multiple publications from the same author or organization are usually regarded as a single source for the purposes of establishing notability." So we need sources either discussing Napier and Cube's primary articles or other peer reviewed sources by experts in the subject. Chemical engineers are obviously not experts on astrophysics, which is why I and others don't see them as reliable sources (see WP:RS for this subject. We really do need sources discussing "coherent catastrophism" directly. I don't think you've provided them and that leads me to wonder why it's so hard to find them. As for Google hits, that's not really a criteria. Note also that Wikipedia is explicitly not a venue to promote new ideas. But I'm basiclly repeating what RegentsPark has said with some elaboration. I think that Wikipedia is sometimes hardest for academics to edit because it is so different from publishing a paper or even a traditional encyclopedia. Doug Weller talk 16:13, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) @WikiNeedsEditing: no Wikipedia is not a democracy, and this is not a vote. We reach decisions based on the principle of consensus. You are welcome to join the discussion, but please be aware that arguments based on already agreed upon policies and guidelines will carry more weight than others (e.g. the number of Google hits). WP:NOTABILITY and WP:FRINGE are particularly relevant in this case.

The definition of fringe we use here on Wikipedia is "an idea that departs significantly from the prevailing views or mainstream views in its particular field". I am not sure how there can be any dispute that coherent catastrophic is a fringe theory. All of the sources Lithopsian has provided describe it as the minority view of a handful of astronomers. The YD impact hypothesis has never been widely accepted. The Burckle group say of their own hypothesis: "I wouldn't expect 99.9 per cent of the scientific community to agree with us". And while I'm sure Sweatman and Tsikritsis are fine researchers in their own fields, they have no expertise in archaeology and their paper on Gobekli is riddled with errors. I really don't think the question here is whether coherent catastrophism is fringe, it's whether it's notable fringe.

If you would like to see this article retained the best thing you can do is find and add the independent secondary sources you referred to. But please make sure they actually say what you claim they say. As Doug has already noted, several of the citations in the article at the moment don't support the statements they're supposed to.

I'll also echo RegentsPark in reminding you that we're not here to do the work of scientists (although many of us are scientists in our day jobs). Good research might thrive on controversy and debate, but a good encyclopaedia is balanced and conservative. We're not equipped to assess ideas on the cutting edge of science. Leave that to the journals; once the issue is settled, we can put it in the encyclopaedia. There's no rush. – Joe (talk) 16:35, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Keep I agree with the previous comment, that the article should be improved, not deleted. So I've added two new sections, liberally referenced with academic sources, which should satisfy requirements. --Iantresman (talk) 18:44, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
- I've also attempted to clean the article up a bit, using the sources Lithopsian found. I'm still not entirely convinced that there's enough coverage to merit a separate article from catastrophism. I'm also wandering how reliable these sources are, since they all seem to support the theory, despite admitting it's a minority view, and are somewhat polemical about opposing (mainstream) views. – Joe (talk) 20:43, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  - A merge to catastrophism may be okay, but that subject is much, much broader and I feel a duly weighted version would be extremely truncated (maybe a sentence or two?) jps (talk) 21:25, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    - Why would we truncate an article when we have the information, and I am sure that more is available if we looked. Wikipedia is supposed to inform. --Iantresman (talk) 08:07, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
      - @Iantresman: Not all information is equal. If this is a minority view (and all the available sources indicate it is), but the only people writing about it are its proponents, we don't have enough material to write an article that conforms to WP:NPOV/WP:DUE. – Joe (talk) 09:57, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        Of course, which is why we use secondary sources, which is what I did, and, I found in included criticism. I also think you misunderstand WP:NPOV. It does not require us to provide counter-points and counter-criticism (especially if none exists), but it requires us to (a) describe what source we do have, neutrally (b) frame those sources in the wider context. For all we know, there will never be any opponents to the "coherent catastrophism", in which case we'd never get an article on the subject. --Iantresman (talk) 11:42, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        There is no requirement to use every possible source. WP:V is a necessary but not sufficient condition. The notability of the research program is quite lacking. It's basically three qausi-Velikovskians who wrote a few popular-level books and published a limited number of papers. I know of research groups at single institutions that are more prolific, larger, and have produced larger bodies of work on topics that are (rightly) only obscure sub-sub-sections of articles here at Wikipedia. jps (talk) 13:38, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        I count at least a dozen different secondary sources in the articles. Even if the idea came from a psychic parrot, it makes no difference. --Iantresman (talk) 14:17, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        Unfortunately, those secondary sources are merely supporting original research that is best left to peer reviewed academic journals. For example, the sentence The current epoch of coherent catastrophism is thought to be caused by a giant comet that entered the inner solar system some 20 to 30 thousand years ago,[13][14] and has fragmented to produce Comet Encke and the Taurid meteor stream.[9][15][16][17][18][19], which contains seven of those sources, none of which appear to mention coherent catastrophism, is better suited to an academic journal where other researchers can judge whether the evidence and conclusions are validly drawn. (Actually, that entire section is WP:OR.) --regentspark (comment) 14:29, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        I don't think so. For example, references [13] and [14] are primary sources, which the Wikipedia article must treat with caution. That doesn't make the section original research in itself, just that it would be better to use secondary sources.--Iantresman (talk) 19:56, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        It is classic original research. Using a bunch of primary sources to provide evidence for a theory that is not mentioned by those sources is exactly what forms original research. Good research, perhaps, but suited for peer review journals which can examine whether the evidence justifies the conclusions drawn by the researchers. Not so suited for an encyclopedia which reports established theories that have been validated by the community. --regentspark (comment) 14:06, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment on sock puppet creator This article was created by a CU confirmed sock of the creator of the first version who in turn was a sock of another editor pushing Sweatman and Tsikritsis, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/FireDrake. If this had been discovered at the time it was created we would simply have deleted the article. It also explains some of the flaws in the article as created and revised by that editor. However, Iantresman has made some significant changes and I may re-evaluate my position on the article. Doug Weller talk 20:35, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Here's the issue (again). The carving out of this particular subject as a subject is done basically in the context of Velikovsky. It is unfortunate that two geology texts makes reference to this, but perhaps not surprising because source churn often creates the appearance of actual research material when someone from outside the field evaluates it (note that the mainstream geology texts refer to "astronomers" as a cohesive unit as though there is discussion about evidence in favor of this proposal which, I insist, there is not). The truth is that Wikipedia has a long history with fringe POV-pushing in this area (there is a discussion related to this on Iantresman's talkpage that I refer to here, but wish not to get bogged down in the details on this page), and I think that Wikipedia runs a great risk of over-empahsizing a topic that simply does not have the notice that other topics have. Just the fact that there seem to be references to a kind of "coherent catastrophism" and "stochastic catastrophism" (notice the redirect) for which there is nothing in the way of consensus among the sources in the throwaway quotes as to what the actual subjects mean. Including discussion of some of this stuff may be appropriate in the main catastrophism page, as would, for example, discussion of the development of learning about major volcanism and impact events in Earth's history. But this subject as a standalone is not articleworthy, I insist. jps (talk) 12:11, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy Delete G4 and G5. Geogene (talk) 13:17, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Delete (preferably) or merge A Google Scholar search turns up some references but they're mostly the same few names over and over again. The hypothesis appears to have been given no attention by the broader physics and astronomy community, not even to debunk it. The notability guideline for fringe theories says "A fringe subject (a fringe theory, organization or aspect of a fringe theory) is considered notable enough for a dedicated article if it has been referenced extensively, and in a serious and reliable manner, by major publications that are independent of their promulgators and popularizers" (emphasis is in the original). I have not seen evidence of sufficiently "extensive" discussion for a standalone article. Contrast this with, say, Velikovsky, which has been sufficiently discussed to merit an article. If the content is to survive at all (and I'm quite skeptical), it should be merged into another article such as catastrophism where it can be discussed in context. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:16, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Delete or Merge. After following up a bit on Doug's excellent analysis of the finer details, I have to agree that the actual degree of coverage in reliable sources for this hypothesis (and seemingly support amongst academics as well) is minimal and superficial. That said, this is not exactly a super out-there notion, and there's some minimal coverage, so I think it warrants mention amongst the span of ideas about catastrophism in general on some article, so I favour a very selective merge (with the small amount of research/support for the theory mentioned explicitly in any article the content is merged into), with delete being the only reasonable option if a merge cannot be supported. Snow ^{let's rap} 00:10, 2 August 2017 (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.