Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fred Diamond

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 keep. (non-admin closure) czar · · 23:50, 11 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Fred Diamond[edit]

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Although slightly noted in relation to the full proof of the modularity theorem where he was one of several who extended Andrew Wiles famous proof, I can't find any evidence that this is not just "a routine professor of a subject at a university". Even his profile page doesn't seem to hint at more. He researches in his field and has a research fellowship by the American Mathematical Society, but there just doesn't seem to be enough here to suggest he is a notable academic in his own right in the sense of WP:N and WP:BIO.

I've considered the spirit of WP:ACADEMIC. While the modularity theorem is a major theorem, I don't think Diamond has been notable because of his involvement in it. From several angles the same conclusions - the theorem was largely a completion/extension of Wiles' historic work in 1995 which was based on Wiles' approaches and completed within some months (so he wasn't the "resolver of a major issue in number theory" at that point), and to underline this, a number of other researchers also seem to have published or collaborated in the same work's completion (see Modularity theorem#History). A check of third party reliable sources shows similarly that they haven't provided significant coverage of him in the sense a bio-article subject is usually discussed. Beyond that there's almost nothing else to draw on. As the guideline observes:

"Many scientists, researchers, philosophers and other scholars ... are notably influential in the world of ideas without their biographies being the subject of secondary sources." (WP:ACADEMIC)

Eyeballs appreciated. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 19:45, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Google scholar shows six publications by Diamond with over 100 citations each, a high number for a low-citation field. I think this is enough to give him a clear pass of WP:PROF#C1, beyond his fame as one of the people who proved the full modularity theorem (which is by the way a very significant result, independent of its connection to Fermat). —David Eppstein (talk) 20:14, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. czar · · 21:29, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But do we have any secondary sources covering him, or signs that he (as an individual) is seen as more than a routine academic, albeit one with highly cited papers? I'm looking for evidence of significant notice being taken by secondary sources in the context of a biographical article, not just our subjective assumptions about citation count. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 23:10, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"Routine academic" and "Highly cited" are two different things. And routine academics don't get the AMS Centeniall Fellowship nor hold visiting positions at the IAS – although neither of those things is sufficient for notability by themselves, I think they add weight to the case. As for your other argument, that he may have had a significant impact as measured e.g. by citations while still failing to have enough secondary sources on which to base an article: that can happen sometimes, but I think it is not a problem here. Plenty of in-depth secondary sources cover his contributions (both the modularity theorem and the book), and I believe that sort of coverage to be a lot more important for academics than coverage of biographical trivia. For factual information like degree and appointment data we can use primary sources such as his cv, but the Notices announcement of his fellowship is secondary, nontrivial, and biographical. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:43, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Clear keep as per Eppstein. GS h-index of 17 is good for mathematicians, plus some very high cites. The nominator should study WP:Prof before making further nominations in this area. Xxanthippe (talk) 22:51, 4 May 2013 (UTC).[reply]
Keep This one pretty clearly passes under WP:PROF C1, as David Eppstein has noted. Ray^Talk 02:10, 5 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Per David Epstein. Mathematics is a field where 10 citations for a paper is a lot. Having several papers with over 100 citations and an H-index of 17 would be close to notable in a high-citation field like Neuroscience, in mathematics it is way beyond any reasonable threshold. --Randykitty (talk) 12:21, 5 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I don't think h-index is even all that relevant here because his papers don't fit the typical curve, i.e. citations are "frontloaded" into a fairly small number of papers. WoS citation list is 233, 69, 60, 53,... so he's written a limited number of rather high impact papers – perfectly acceptable under WP:PROF c1. Agricola44 (talk) 15:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC).[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 15:30, 7 May 2013 (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.