Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Titanic alternative theories

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 No consensus to delete. Merging and other activities can be discussed at the talk page. Stifle (talk) 19:48, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Titanic alternative theories[edit]

Ah yes, the mummy's curse. Now, in the Sinking of the RMS Titanic article, I wouldn't mind having a paragraph mentioning the three sourced theories (pack ice, coal fire, Olympic). However, as it stands now, this article is a hash of unreferenced absurdities (torpedo, mummy) and a long advertisement for the Olympic theory. No need for keeping this. Biruitorul (talk) 16:45, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merge - Sourced, relevant info should be merged into the Sinking of the RMS Titanic article. The rest (mummies?) should be deleted. Tnxman307 (talk) 17:20, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak keep my first thought was merge per above, but then there'd be an obvious argument for splitting it out for reasons of style/length. No opinion on the mummies. JJL (talk) 18:30, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Please see here for something we could easily sneak into the main "sinking" article. If it starts getting a lot longer, we can split again, but I think all the important notes are hit there. Biruitorul (talk) 19:59, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge a highly trimmed version as above into the sinking article. These are for the most part theories promoted by single authors or small cadres and do not have the notability for exhaustive recounting, which is WP:POV as there is too little encyclopedic and balanced discussion, presumably due to lack of material in depth. --Dhartung | Talk 22:37, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Let's keep alternative theories separately from main article. This must be better sourced however.Biophys (talk) 01:37, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- But is the depth this goes into necessary? The really encyclopedic component of these theories can, as I believe I've showed, be neatly packaged into a couple of sentences - anything more would be giving undue weight to these ideas. They exist, they're sourced, we can mention them, but a separate article just isn't needed here. Biruitorul (talk) 02:22, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge as per nominator. --Doug Weller (talk) 17:54, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak keep But merge? NO WAY!! I hate the idea that the theories of pseudoscience attention-grabbers would be merged into a serious encyclopedia article about the sinking of the Titanic. That would be a serious mistake, kind of like putting "It was a hoax" comments in an article about the man landing on the moon. There's no denying that people have published books and people have bought them about silly theories, and mention can be made in an article about such publications; the excellent article Sinking of the RMS Titanic could include a sentence that says "There are alternative theories about the cause of the sinking for people who want to hear from the lunatic fringe. Mandsford (talk) 23:50, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge Everything substantial and relevant can be summarized. Dahn (talk) 08:07, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Keep: per Mandsford. I'm sympathetic to the argument for keeping something around to serve as a catchment for the fringe loonies who, however offbeat, have here a wildly notable main subject with provable sourcing for the crackpots. RGTraynor 17:01, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge a sourced and relevant sentence or two into Sinking of the RMS Titanic. I seriously considered !voting to delete this as it's so bad. Hut 8.5 18:43, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Condense and merge into Sinking of the RMS Titanic. The POV forks need to be put into proper context, and there is plenty of room in the target article for a summary without giving it undue weight. This isn't the Kennedy assassination or the collapse of the World Trade Center here. B.Wind (talk) 23:32, 9 May 2008 (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.