Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Middle-Urals Ring Structure

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. ✗plicit 03:37, 22 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Middle-Urals Ring Structure[edit]

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Not seeing how this is a notable. This was originally discussed in some conference abstracts by G. Burba, and since then has only been discussed in two academic papers by one author, John M. Saul, and even then, the mention of the claims is brief. There's not really any critical scrutiny of the claims that would be required to construct a proper encyclopedic article. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:33, 15 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think I need to do an analysis of the conference abstracts, which per Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Massive_Australian_Precambrian/Cambrian_Impact_Structure do not count towards notability, but I will do some analysis of the Saul Papers. The first one I will analyse Circular scars dating to the Earth's accretionary period (open access), published in Energy Procedia, a publisher of conference proceedings, is relatively short. The only mention of the impactor claims is in a figure and caption, which I will quote in full LHB scar circles associated with petroleum and deep gas in the region west of the Middle Urals. The supergiant Romashkino oilfield is situated within a 210 km diameter scar (infolded map in [15]) and the Arlan supergiant oilfield is located along the tangent shared by this scar and the adjacent c.420 km “Middle-Ural Ring Structure” [16-17]. Where 16-17 are references to the conference abstracts of G. Burba.

The second paper, Transparent gemstones and the most recent supercontinent cycle is published in International Geology Review, the paper includes a 300 word paragraph on the claims, which notes that Saul had previously come up with the idea independently, and had published it in his 2014 book "A Geologist Speculates on Gemstones, Origins of Gas and Oil, Moonlike Impact Scars on the Earth, the Emergence of Animals and Cancer", published Les 3 Colonnes, a review of this book by Quintin Wight, published in the journal Rocks & Minerals [1] notes that the book is highly speculative and states [Saul] presents evidence that continental cratons thousands of kilometers across may be attributed to gigantic meteorite strikes during the period known as the late heavy bombardment (LHB), 4.1– 3.8 billion years ago, and he postulates that cooling of meteorite-induced melt may have produced dense rock that sank into lighter rock and changed the patterns of subduction that may have gone before. In a sense, he is challenging some of the aspects of uniformitarianism that has held sway for much of the last century. He is also saying that the very deep fracture patterns created by those LHB impacts persist to this day, despite tectonic movement, and could control the formation of gem deposits and allow for the upward migration of fluids and gases. I'm not knowledgeable on this topic, but this seems pretty WP:FRINGE. Hemiauchenia (talk) 07:01, 16 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:33, 15 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Geography-related deletion discussions. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:33, 15 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Russia-related deletion discussions. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:33, 15 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete I did search for additional sources and didn't come up with anything better than the above described. The evidence also looks pretty circumstantial and doesn't include any shocked quartz or anything. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 10:22, 16 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete in the absence of better supporting evidence (overturned beds, impact breccia, shocked quartz, shatter cones). --Kent G. Budge (talk) 15:23, 16 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Nowhere near enough to support notability. Mikenorton (talk) 16:36, 16 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Very speculative. This alleged feature lacks the published supporting evidence and detailed arguments needed to support notability. Also, lacks any detailed discussions and / or commentary by secondary sources and experts. A publication that fails to add anything new is Saul, J.M.A., 1978. Circular structures of large scale and great age on the Earth's surface. Nature, 271(5643), pp.345-349, The "2014 book" is Saul, J.M.A., 2014. A Geologist Speculates. Les, 3, 159 pp. Paul H. (talk) 02:36, 17 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Additional comment - The origin, and even existence, of geological ring structures in itself a controversial realm of study with no current agreement whether they are either endogenous, exogenous, extraterrestrial, or some mixture of these in origin. Also, there is disagreement over whether specific geologic ring structures are either actually real features of the geologic version of pareidolia. Therefore, before featuring any specific ring structure in a Wikipedia article, it needs to be documented and discussed in secondary sources as in case of the Nastapoka arc. Paul H. (talk) 20:48, 17 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Paul H.: Aye, I've been thinking of taking Diamantina River ring feature to deletion for the reasons you describe. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:58, 17 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Unlike the Middle-Urals Ring Structure, the Diamantina River ring feature has been discussed in detail in one peer-reviewed primary source (journal paper) and two peer-reviewed secondary sources (a paper and book chapter). Unfortunately, they are all by the same senior author, Dr. Andrew Glikson. However, Dr. Andrew Glikson is an internationally respected planetary geologist. About the Diamantina River ring feature, Dr. Andrew Glikson concluded that "A potential interpretation of the ring structure in terms of asteroid impact cannot be confirmed or rejected given the present state of knowledge, ..." I have access to these and other sources. Paul H. (talk) 03:04, 18 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I looked through the recent Australian impact cratering record: Updates and recent discoveries, and there was no mention of the feature. I think when covering speculative impact crater claims, there needs to be some uninvolved secondary coverage, which this feature unfortunately lacks. I agree thought that the sourcing is much better in this case than for the Middle-Urals Ring Structure. Hemiauchenia (talk) 03:20, 18 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to the lack of significant uninvolved secondary coverage, the Diamantina River ring feature is just one of several similar size, even larger, ring and multiring features / "structures" that have been mapped using gravity, topographic maps, and aerial imagetry of Australia as sketched in figures 1, 4, and others of:

O'Driscoll, E.S.T. and Campbell, I.B., 1996. Mineral deposits related to Australian continental ring and rift structures with some terrestrial and planetary analogies. Global Tectonics and Metallogeny, pp.83-101.

In this respect, Diamantina River ring feature lacks notibility. Also, like the other "ring structures" / features of O'Driscoll and others, they remain speculative and elusive entities so far lacking anything that can be observed in outcrop or in local geologic mapping that can be associated with them with any degree of certainty. Paul H. (talk) 06:00, 18 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - On the Russian internet, cited sources I have seen are the same few sources in English already mentioned above. GeoWriter (talk) 13:45, 17 December 2021 (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.