Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Modern geocentrism

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 merge to Geocentrism. (non-admin closure) — ΛΧΣ21™ 13:54, 16 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Modern geocentrism[edit]

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I believe that the fundamental rule for inclusion in Wikipedia is WP:42. In this case, I think that the vast majority of this article is original research, relying on primary sources that believe in geocentrism, or stating things that cannot be verified. A lot of the claims are made in the article that do not seem to have independent sources. I also note that Wikipedia's guidelines of fringe theories seem to say that the topic must be treated in a serious way by non-believers in reliable publications, but there are none referenced to the article and in my search this morning I found almost no texts that referred to this idea as a legitimate movement. Junjunone (talk) 16:35, 28 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. ★☆ DUCKISPEANUTBUTTER☆★ 20:26, 28 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Religion-related deletion discussions. ★☆ DUCKISPEANUTBUTTER☆★ 20:26, 28 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Below are my thoughts in support of keeping the article.

65.128.191.161 (talk) 00:52, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Notability. WP guidelines state that "ideas that are of borderline or minimal notability may be mentioned in Wikipedia, but should not be given undue weight" and "WP summarizes significant opinions, with representation in proportion to their prominence". This implies a more concise article, properly written to avoid creating support or undue weight... not deletion. And some articles on WP may simply be longer than others, or included, without necessarily implying a certain level of importance over another.

For example, an article about a U.S. president versus an article about a Star Wars book character, or something else that's really esoteric.

Sources and Undue Weight. WP says "[it] is considered notable enough for a dedicated article if it has been referenced extensively, and in a serious and reliable manner, in at least one major publication that is independent of their promulgators and popularizers." This seems to support deletion at first glance. However, note this important caveat: "Many encyclopedic topics can be evaluated from a number of different perspectives, and some of these perspectives may make claims that lack verification in research, that are inherently untestable, or that are pseudoscientific. [...] Claims derived from fringe theories should be carefully attributed to an appropriate source and located within a context. [...] Such claims may contain or be followed by qualifiers to maintain neutrality."

With this in mind, the article is certainly not presenting its theories as facts, nor in anywhere the equal weight of modern consensus. The opening paragraph details exactly how the theory is viewed, by whom, in what context, and with what weight (specifically, that it is directly opposed to scientific consensus, and it has strong ties to theological beliefs, and if you went to preschool, common sense clearly reveals just how popular the view is). It instead presents what its adherents believe, and how these issues conflict with modern science, without biased words making it seem as though the conflict is considered to be one on equal ground.

It's true that there won't be many scholarly sources available in support of a fringe belief, but that's by nature. WP doesn't require this though, UNLESS the text of the article is clearly in support of the theory. WP only requires sources ABOUT the subject, it's believers, notable issues, etc. For example, sources which:

- Confirm the belief is (even borderline) significant in some way

- Describe the belief

- Confirm the existence of believers, and/or their estimated numbers

- Describe significant figures or events relating to the belief

Similar Example. Scientology is a relatively low-adherent, modern-science-rejected belief that's given many long pages on WP. Do you know anyone personally who believes in Scientology? Can you get an accurate figure of Scientologists? Can you find any scholarly articles that seriously support dianetics, thetans, etc? Does Scientology deserve an article X number of pages long, which implies undue weight? No, but the belief is culturally significant, especially with its legal issues, and that's why it's included.

Conclusion. I believe modern geocentricity properly adheres to WP guidelines, and warrants inclusion. It exists (has believers), and it has notable links to other major areas of science and theology, mainstream and otherwise. We can't make a deletion call simply based on what we believe to be the number of believers or the absurdity of the belief.

As for the article itself, it does seem to be pretty messy, containing some uncited, biased, and cluttered information. But those things can be fixed. Maybe what people view as the biggest problem parts should be removed until the article becomes more stable. I've already put some work into it, and rewrote the introduction.

Response

I've considered this statement carefully and I thank the author for it. However, I see one glaring problem with the argument: there are no independent, reliable sources that even mention the subject of modern geocentrism. Rather unlike Scientology about which entire libraries of independent, reliable sources have been written, I cannot find any reliable sources that deal with this subject in a substantive way. For example, the definitive scholarly work on the subject of creationism by Ronald Numbers does not even make a passing mention of the contemporary support for geocentrism: [1]. Geocentrism is mentioned in his book as either 1) the original 16th century argument, 2) referencing the fact that the Lutheran Church: Missouri Synod continued to hold to a Ptolemaic Universe well into the twentieth century (though they no longer do, apparently), or 3) as a context for a controversy that existed in the 1960s where the Bible-Science Newsletter/Bible-Science Association(I notice we have no articles about those topics which appear to me to be much more notable than the one we're discussing here) published articles advocating a Tychonic viewpoint and that later the Creation Research Society's newsletter also published some similar articles. No mention of continued support for this is made by Numbers. The proposal that this is a contemporary monolithic proposal or one that can be captured by a singular ideology of "modern geocentrism" seems entirely made-up by Wikipedia, actually. In other words, this idea is so obscure that a 500 page scholarly book on the subject by the person who is arguably the foremost expert on the subject does not even mention the position as it is defined in our article. I think this is extremely damning: we don't have any independent sources from which to write the article. All we have is a lot of noise from various personal websites. Junjunone (talk) 14:20, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 20:38, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as not meeting the WP:GNG in any way separate from other articles about geocentricism. Might support a redirect. Perhaps someone can work on finding reliable independent sources to build up a legitimate section elsewhere, at which point we can discuss the merits of a spinout. Vcessayist (talk) 01:36, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I don't understand the claim that there are no independent, reliable sources that even mention the subject of modern geocentrism. Google books search and Google scholar search turn up a sufficient number of reliable sources mentioning modern geocentrism to establish notability. Much of the content is already covered by appropriate citations, and I think much else could also be sourced. We should not delete an article on a notable topic because of repairable defects. --Lambiam 01:52, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
- Google scholar counts 20 hits. Most of them are to primary sources that seem to use the term because they found it on Wikipedia. A vanishing few are serious enough to be worthy of consideration, and these do not treat the subject seriously or in-depth enough to justify a whole article.Google books is even worse with a number of self-published pieces cribbed unapologetically from Wikipedia. Which sources do you think are best to base the article on? Junjunone (talk) 13:51, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Dori ☾Talk ☯ Contribs☽ 00:31, 13 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge to Geocentrism, which already has a section on this. Modern geocentrism seems to be the same as regular geocentrism. Some discussion of modern adherents may be appropriate. Google searches turn up rather marginal web sites. --John Nagle (talk) 06:02, 13 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Merge - a Coatrack for Creationism? Substantial parts of it are unsourced WP:OR. Other parts are accurate (sourced or not) but largely duplicate articles on Geocentrism, Copernicus, Newton etc. I'd support a merge to Geocentrism; there are very few sources actually for "Modern" geocentrism, which seems no different from the older kind. Perhaps some of it could be used in Creationism. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:11, 13 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge to Geocentrism after editing it down to half. About half of this article is an OR/Synthesis essay. Topic should be covered in WIkipedia, but it can be easily and suitably done in the Geocentrism article. North8000 (talk) 14:24, 13 October 2012 (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.