Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche (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 keep. m.o.p 05:56, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche[edit]

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This article is largely a synthesis and a summary of a single book. Since it's last AfD, little has been done to improve it (the result was a withdrawn nomination). Scholars have compared Kierkegaard and Nietzsche; there have also been comparisons of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Heidegger; Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Levinas; etc. Scholars have compared Locke and Aristotle, but I do not think that a Locke and Aristotle article would be warranted. The same logic applies here. An article on Kierkegaard and Nietzsche could in principle be warranted as a spin-off (which does not require independent notability) if the inclusion of all sourced material actually did make the articles on Kierkegaard and Nietzsche unwieldy, but most of this article is original research. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 23:56, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. -- RJC ^Talk_Contribs 23:58, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Oppose. What I see here is a short article with no less than 5 references, actually 6, since one book is cited without an inline citation. I have seen longer articles than this with fewer references. The nominator says "little has been done to improve it," but one does not nominate an article for deletion because it needs to be improved. The article was nominated, he received strong opposition, and he withdrew the nomination. The article has not changed and neither have the issues involved. The article should be improved and expanded, but as I said, that is not what AfD is for. AfD is for articles that cannot be salvaged. This one certainly can, but the claims made by the nominator are simply false. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 00:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment My reason for nomination is not that little has been done to improve the article. My reason is that it is not notable. The rest of the nomination answers objections to this. So, for example, one is that we have been through this already. I suggest that we haven't, that the AfD was withdrawn in face of arguments that the article should be improved, that it hasn't been improved, and that withdrawn nomination differs from a consensus to keep. Another objection might be that a lot has been written on this. So I suggest that verifiability does not equal notability, that many comparisons have been drawn that clearly do not warrant additional articles, etc. A third objection might be that this is a spin-off and should be treated as such, and so I suggest that there is not enough material here that is not original research to trigger this. At a basic level, though, the objection is to notability. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 02:46, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete This is not an article about a notable relationship. It is just a side by side comparison of two people. It is well done and admirably clear and concise. However that is not what an encyclopedia is for. Consider that if there were 100 things that could be compared each to each other that would be 10,000 articles and no more information would be given than in the original 100. Jaque Hammer (talk) 21:42, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Weak keep. I basically agree with the rationale for deletion - that articles simply comparing two philosophers are not encyclopedic - but I cannot quite bring myself to support deletion. There should be a way of changing the article to make it encyclopedic. The article's actual topic appears to be Nietzsche's view of Kierkegaard, and I have moved it accordingly. Nietzsche's view of Kierkegaard may or may not be a suitable topic for an article (I am not that familiar with Wikipedia's criteria for notability, so I cannot say) but it is not obviously unencyclopdic in the way that a simple comparison between them is. Philosophy Teacher (talk) 03:48, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Withdraw. The article is no longer substantially similar to the one nominated. I'm not sure the new article topic is notable, either (why doesn't this belong in Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, if anywhere?), but for clarity's sake there should be a new AfD. Because there was a vote to delete, a withdrawn nomination does not automatically close the discussion. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 17:25, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The article is hardly "no longer substantially similar to the one nominated." All that I did was to move it to a different and more appropriate name, and remove some unencyclopedic content (the rather child-like list of similarities and differences between Kierkegaard and Nietzsche). Most of the article was about Nietzsche's view of Kierkegaard even before my changes, so RJC's original reason for deletion was quite mistaken. As I said, it is possible that an article about Nietzsche's view of Kierkegaard may not be worthwhile, but the decision of whether to keep or delete the article has to be based on what it actually is, not what its former title misleadingly suggested it was. Philosophy Teacher (talk) 01:23, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, I think you'll find that a new AfD would be pointless. This one looks like it's continuing regardless of your withdrawal of the nomination. Philosophy Teacher (talk) 01:30, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete comparisons of philosphers are not encyclopedic, they are academic and an interesting subject for scholars but not encyclopedias. }}}}
That's completely wrong. The article is not now, and never really was, mainly a comparison of Kierkegaard and Nietzsche - rather, it was about the latter's view of the former. My edits were simply meant to make that clearer. Philosophy Teacher (talk) 01:25, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Firstly, the second AfD was proposed too soon after the first, particularly when the issue of giving time to allow the article to develop was raised by two of the three voters in the first AfD.

Second, if Philosophy Teacher's renaming of the article fit the content, then his deletion of content that did not fit the new title might have been unnecessary, no? Especially when his reason for the new title was in order to fit the content.

03:45, 12 February 2011 Philosophy Teacher (talk | contribs) m (4,659 bytes) (moved Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche to Friedrich Nietzsche's view of Søren Kierkegaard: Judging from the way the article is written, this is its actual topic.)

03:51, 12 February 2011 Philosophy Teacher (talk | contribs) (3,611 bytes)(deleted points of comparison - out of place, given that the article's actual topic is Nietzsche's view of Kierkegaard, to judge from the first paragraph)

This is not the only unhelpful change during the AfDs in my opinion. This is the article at its best and this is the diff between that and today The major differences are obvious. I call your attention to the farcical replacement of an easily verifiable statement "Most researchers believe that Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) knew little of" with the tie-me-to-the-mast-and-damn-the-torpedos stance of "Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) knew little of", all because of the WP crusade against weasel words. I am reminded by a lesson that I learned from probably the most contentious and biased editor I know on WP...even a stopped clock is right once a day. He said that the lead does not have to have citations. The rest of the article is the verification for it. In the same way, unsupported claims, however weaseloid, can inform the reader quickly and cleanly and be verified elsewhere.

If the article is restored, I recommend moving the comparison of the two philosophers' approach to Christian topics out of the lead to a separate paragraph in the Points of Comparison section. Anarchangel (talk) 02:51, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Your objections to my edits to the article would be better discussed on its talk page. Philosophy Teacher (talk) 01:27, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - an obscure topic, but not a non-notable one. The references provided show that the topic of Kierkegaard's influence on Nietzsche is one that has been the subject of at least some scholarly attention. I'd suggest considering a merge to Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, but I don't think this is that problematic as an independent article either. As for the nominator, if you think there are enough relevant reliable sources to write an article on Locke and Aristotle without venturing into original research, feel free to do so. Robofish (talk) 22:34, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This is the sort of content that should be encouraged and further developed. Given two approximately equally notable people, it can be clearer to keep this as a separate article. DGG ( talk ) 02:21, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Søren Kierkegaard is actually a fairly notable philosopher even though I personally disagree with his attitude towards natural theology. We can always remove the other guy from the title if he turns out to be less notable. The Mysterious El Willstro (talk) 08:15, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment. The other guy? Not sure whether Nietzsche is notable? The question isn't whether Kierkegaard is notable. We have Søren Kierkegaard. We also have Philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard, just as we have Friedrich Nietzsche and Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. The question is whether a comparison of the two is notable, or (as the article now stands) whether Nietzsche's views of Kierkegaard are of such length that they cannot be put into the Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche article. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 20:07, 16 February 2011 (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.