Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elementary Calculus: An Infinitesimal Approach

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 Non-admin closure as Keep. v/r - T P 02:26, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Elementary Calculus: An Infinitesimal Approach

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Not notable. Satisfies none of the criteria of WP:NB: the closest is the first as it has a few reviews but all in specialist publications, no general coverage. No other indication of notability. JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 00:48, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. A widely cited, and respected, textbook on an infinitesimal approach to calculus. The book was the subject of a much-discussed field study by K. Sullivan a few years after the first edition came out, and went through two or three editions. To note is the fact that the nominator did not even bother to request improvements on the talkpage of the article. Tkuvho (talk) 00:58, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It is not a requirement of AfD that an editor first discusses it on the talk page; such a discussion is not likely to attract enough editors. The place for the discussion is here. That it is a good textbook (but not good enough to keep in print), the number of editions or that someone wrote a paper mentioning it is not enough; it needs coverage outside of mathematics.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 01:20, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. This is an academic book, so per WP:NB#Academic books the normal rules don't apply literally but must be interpreted using common sense: "For these reasons, the bulk of standards delineated previously for mainstream books are incompatible in the academic bailiwick. Again, common sense should prevail. In such cases, suggested bases for a finding of notability include whether the book is published by an academic press, how widely the book is cited by other academic publications or in the media, how influential the book is considered to be in its specialty area, or adjunct disciplines, and whether it is taught or required reading in a number of reputable educational institutions."
I can't really say much about the book as I am not familiar with it. It is mostly of interest to non-standard analysis people, and that subject is off the mainstream of mathematics and logic. If it's among their two or three most important books, then it might be worth keeping it. The field study thing almost sounds as if it could alone be enough to make this book notable. There aren't many maths books that have studies made about them. Hans Adler 01:24, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's not just Sullivan's study. The book became something of a cause celebre in the 70s following Errett Bishop's attack on it, see criticism of non-standard analysis. The idea of deleting this is ill-informed. Tkuvho (talk) 01:40, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, sufficient attention by journals within the field, which are considered WP:RS, to meet the requirements of the general notability guideline. The "coverage outside of mathematics" approach has no basis in Wikipedia policy or guidelines. It is not a generally accepted practice to find new and exciting reasons to delete articles. Chester Markel (talk) 01:37, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions. — Logan _Talk ^{Contributions} 02:00, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"coverage outside of mathematics" was my paraphrasing of the first criteria of WP:BK: "The book has been the subject of multiple, non-trivial published works appearing in sources that are independent of the book itself, with at least some of these works serving a general audience" (my emphasis). If instead the academic criteria is used it is neither published by an academic press nor likely to be widely taught/required reading as it's out of print. The reference to Criticism of non-standard analysis is interesting. The article's a bit of a mess now but it started out as a summary of one of the reviews of this book: [1], which from the article now seems did not go down well. I'm not sure that a few letters in the same journal makes it a 'cause celebre'.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 02:13, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Please. "The criteria are" or "The criterion is". Michael Hardy (talk) 00:03, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If the subject matter of an article meets the requirements of WP:GNG, it is not necessary for it to also satisfy a specific notability guideline. The specific guidelines are intended to augment the general guideline, providing a basis for the notability of subjects that do not satisfy the general guideline but are nonetheless considered sufficiently important for inclusion. If non-compliance with subject-specific guidelines furnished an independent basis for deletion, then WP:GNG would be eviscerated, applying only to a few oddball subjects for which no specific guidance is provided. The general consensus of the community is that meeting WP:GNG ⇒ notability unless proven otherwise. Chester Markel (talk) 02:25, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The book was published by Prindle, Weber and Schmidt. I have never heard of them, but it appears they were a publisher specialised on mathematics (especially undergraduate level) and closely related topics and went out of business in 1987. I guess they were an appropriate publisher for a book that was intended to revolutionise the way mathematics is taught. The section about academic books is not very detailed and explicitly insists on applying common sense. In this context it's absurd to interpret "suggested bases [...] include whether the book is published by an academic press" as ruling out a book that was published by a publisher specialised on academic teaching, that is now available online, and which, by the way, is being republished by Dover Publications although currently out of print. The second Dover edition is expected to come out in February 2012 and can be pre-ordered from Amazon. [2] The book is in extremely good company there, as many of the absolutely top mathematics books have been republished by Dover in recent years.
In general, "at least some of these works serving a general audience" is clearly intended to keep out tiny specialist communities and fringe communities. This book seems to have been discussed widely in the entire mathematics community – which makes sense, as the mathematical community had to decide whether to switch to this new approach to teaching mathematics to undergraduates. While it is very likely that the discussion was covered by the Times Higher Education Supplement and in the higher education pages of a small number of top newspapers, I believe proving this is not really required in this situation, since the full mathematical community is much bigger than the various subcommunities that we normally use for establishing academic notability. Hans Adler 08:46, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your thorough research. I did not know the book is being re-published. Do you think it would be appropriate to mention this in the article? Tkuvho (talk) 09:34, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The point about its being out of print neglects the fact that for some years it's been downloadable free of charge on the web. Michael Hardy (talk) 00:10, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Between the various editions of the book and its companion volume for the instructor, one gets over 400 cites at google scholar. Note that the book is available online, so there is no problem using it in teaching. Tkuvho (talk) 03:36, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep seems important enough. --Salix (talk): 07:44, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Guidelines should be applied with common sense; applying NBOOK to insist that high-level scientific works cannot be notable if they are not reviewed for general audiences fails that test. I think that part of NBOOK was intended mostly to apply to things like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" books, which if covered only in sources aimed at fans of the series would not be treated as individually notable. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 23:06, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, per Hans Adler and Hullaballoo Wolfowitz. Notability is a tool for detecting and removing marketing spam. It wasn't originally meant to be used indiscriminately to cut out topics of genuine academic interest, and to use it in this way is to pervert its intent.—S Marshall T/C 23:13, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it's only for the purpose of eliminating marketing spam. (But definitely this item is notable.) Michael Hardy (talk) 16:20, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. In an area in which nearly all textbooks are copies of each other, this one is the first (and so far maybe the only one?) to bring to the first-year undergraduate level an approach to mathematical analysis that had been making waves in the mathematical community. It is famous. Michael Hardy (talk) 23:59, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Bishop's review of this book itself has multiple nontrivial published works that cite it: see e.g. [3], arXiv:1007.3018, or additional works by Dauben, Artigue, and Tall cited in footnote 16 of the arxiv paper. It seems clear that this book has indeed been quite controversial, and this controversy together with the field study cited in the article this goes well beyond the more basic "subject of multiple nontrivial published reviews" standard for books. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:59, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I believe it ticks the notability boxes. Gandalf61 (talk) 12:22, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep – Where do I start? — Fly by Night (talk) 17:25, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep This is a famous book, which received widespread discussion when it appears, and now is re-issued. (The author is the logician for whom Wittgenstein had the greatest respect, because of his courage in thinking.) I would ask that people refrain from PRODing further articles associated with Tkuvho, given a recent escalation of irritation with Dr. William M. Connolley. These PRODs are interfering with the natural development of these articles, and sapping the time and energy of the WP mathematicians. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:01, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's interesting, I was not aware of that. Do you have some details on Wittgenstein on Keisler? Incidentally, prods and deletion attempts don't bother me; they tend to focus attention on important pages. Perhaps they will nominate ghosts of departed quantities and standard part function next. Tkuvho (talk) 20:01, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It is unclear why you're invoking me by name here (albeit incorrectly: I've corrected you). It wasn't my PROD. Perhaps you might want to reconsider your won role in this? William M. Connolley (talk) 21:29, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - I don't quite see how the book fails WP:NB #1 and #4. Moreover one has to consider that the formulation of that guideline primarily targets fiction and popular literature, so applying it strictly to the letter in #1 by arguing this math book was not discussed in general interest publications seems a bit nonsensical to me. In any case #4 holds as far as I can tell, i.e. there are/have been university courses being taught based on that book.--Kmhkmh (talk) 20:03, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

it fails #1 as it needs coverage in "at least some ... works serving a general audience", precisely to exclude works that have only limited narrow coverage: nowhere does it indicate this only applies to fiction or popular literature. It fails #4 as is not the subject of study. The footnote makes this clear: "This criterion does not include textbooks or reference books written specifically for study in educational programs, but only independent works deemed sufficiently significant to be the subject of study themselves, such as major works in philosophy, literature, or science." This relates to previous comments: a couple of editors have asserted it is "famous". If it were famous I would expect it satisfy #1 with ease, as there would be coverage outside of specialist journals: in the mainstream press for example, or at least in widely read journals such as Science.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 20:59, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I misread #4 overlooking the word "subject", thanks for pointing that out. However in that case it is similar to the #1 case, i.e. the application of the rules primarily geared towards fiction and popular nonfiction on purely academic books makes little sense (as pointed out by Adler further up already). So I stay with keep--Kmhkmh (talk) 21:44, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

At WP:Notability (books) we find this:

Academic books

Academic books serve a very different function and come to be published through very different processes than do books intended for the general public. They are often highly specialized, have small printing runs, and may only be available in specialized libraries and bookstores. For these reasons, the bulk of standards delineated previously for mainstream books are incompatible in the academic bailiwick. Again, common sense should prevail. In such cases, suggested bases for a finding of notability include whether the book is published by an academic press, how widely the book is cited by other academic publications or in the media, how influential the book is considered to be in its specialty area, or adjunct disciplines, and whether it is taught or required reading in a number of reputable educational institutions.

@John Blackburne: When you write "If it were famous" you seem like a crackpot. To suggest that this book is not famous is to appear ignorant. Michael Hardy (talk) 02:37, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comment. The issue here is not so much crackpotiness as being uninformed. A related discussion is taking place at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Mathematics#Ghosts_of_departed_quantities, perhaps you could contribute if you get a chance. Tkuvho (talk) 03:55, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I would ask that we stick to discussing the article and not make assumptions or accusations about other editors' competence. But if it's famous then where is the coverage? A famous scientist is one with awards, with articles and interviews in the press etc. A famous poem is one that's known, often by heart, by generations. A famous book is usually one with cultural or historic significance, widely known if not widely read among a large number of the general public. By any normal definition of the word this book is not famous.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 17:38, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - If Wikipedia is going to have any coverage for non-standard analysis I think we should keep this article. One might argue that the idea of teaching elementary calculus with non-standard methods has not caught on, but removing articles about the attempts seems like missing the point. Will we next be deleting the article on Abraham Robinson? The author of this text, H. Jerome Keisler is a well-known mathematician in his own right, with 51 doctoral students. His textbook on Model Theory gets 2,900 citations on Google Scholar. It is fun that Errett Bishop denounced Keisler's approach; see Criticism of non-standard_analysis#Bishop's review. Including this kind of material in Wikipedia may help our readers understand this conceptually-interesting but not-very-popular corner of mathematics. EdJohnston (talk) 22:03, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - It is an obvious book to keep in the area of non-standard analysis, I can't see why it was nominated for deletion in the first place. Also I'm a sucker for pretty pictures :) Dmcq (talk) 10:00, 28 May 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.