Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts

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 speedy keep. MER-C 09:57, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts

A POVish "cherry picked" list. Little or no references to support inclusion. Delete and salt the Earth. --Pizzazz 00:24, 31 January 2007 (UTC)— Pizzazz (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

I favor deletion. There are no objective criteria for what does or does not belong on the list. It is just a list of things that some WP editors want to badmouth.

It is like having a list of politicians who have been called idiots. It is not useful for anything, and does not inform as to who is an idiot. Roger 00:40, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Please note the nominator's sole contribution to Wikipedia is this AfD Special:Contributions/Pizzazz does that say Wikipedia:Sock puppetry ? signed Jeepday 03:37, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delete indeed, it's always been problematic and serves no real purpose I can see. Arker 00:41, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy Keep. There are no 100% objective criteria for anything except in Mathematics. Everything else is to some degree subjective. Clearly there are a lot of pseudoscientic concepts around, like e.g. creationism etc. A list of things that are considered to be pseudoscientific by the scientific community is a pretty objective and verifiable criterium.

It's certainly not like a list of politicians that have been called idiot at all. I challenge people to point out entries on the list that are not considered to be nonsensical by the scientific community. Count Iblis 01:05, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Having no references is not an article deletion criterion, nor are POV problems. Also, "objectivity" is not the overarching standard for content inclusion on Wikipedia (this term is even avoided on policy and guideline pages); verifiability is. The standard for inclusion on this page is that members of the scientific community have labeled a field or concept as pseudoscientific. Whether a field of endeavor or concept has been labeled so is verifiable. Simões (^talk/_contribs) 01:16, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Science and pseudoscience can be judged in the same way that the relability of sources can be judged. The notion that it is just someone's POV is silly, foolish and dangerous and the sort of thing I'd expect to hear some one who's found their own pet crank theory listed here. Tough. --Michael C. Price ^talk 01:21, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - As Per Michael, Science and pseudoscience can be judged in a non-biased fashion. That leaves only the unsourced complaint, which is not grounds for deletion. --Falcorian ^(talk) 01:37, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Michael and others. JoshuaZ 01:40, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. While the list itself may not have references, the articles on each individual topic have plenty of references to support being labeled as pseudoscientific. (The blurb at the top even explains: See the individual articles for more information.) Krimpet 01:50, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep This list is a good complement to category:pseudoscience, cf. WP:CSL. AS WP:CG says, "Categories appear without annotations, so be careful of NPOV when creating or filling categories. Unless it is self-evident and uncontroversial that something belongs in a category, it should not be put into a category. A list might be a better option." Thus, having this list allows a topic to be listed along with information about who said it is pseudoscientific and why. And that, mis amigos, is what NPOV and VER are all about. Jim Butler^(talk) 01:52, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Most of the arguments for keeping have been made by others. Winterborn 02:22, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy Keep Most lists have vague or no inclusion criteria, making them inherently POV and OR. However, this article actually has a rather specific Characteristics section that lays out exactly what qualifies as psuedoscience. The inclusion criteria are very specific. As to no references, see the Further reading section at the bottom. -- Kesh 03:08, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- Per Jeepday below, this user has no edits outside this nom. Changed vote to Speedy and tagged nom as single-purpose account. -- Kesh 05:01, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per all other keep votes Tuvok^^{Talk|Desk|Contribs} 03:31, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Looks like Pizzazz was set up just to nominate the article. The list is well researched and well written. Looks like I don't even need to vote, so lets close this one. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 03:34, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Vote Speedy Keep for sock nomination of a well referenced article. Jeepday 03:43, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletions. -- SkierRMH 04:14, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. -- Fropuff 04:45, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep it isn't a matter of opinion as to whether or not something is science or pseudoscience. Koweja 05:40, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Yes, this list needs to be policed to avoid insertion of POV, but a blatantly fake science like phrenology is a fake science, period. Doczilla 07:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Kesh. --Bduke 07:42, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This discussion has been added as a test case to the proposed guideline Wikipedia:Notability (science). –trialsanderrors 09:09, 31 January 2007 (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.