Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of important publications in chemistry

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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. Those objecting to the term "important" can use the article's talk page to help define the article's scope. -- Ed (Edgar181) 19:49, 31 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

List of important publications in chemistry

List of important publications in chemistry (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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This is essentially per the community consensus at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of important publications in biology - original research. StAnselm (talk) 21:28, 24 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions.  --Lambiam 22:10, 24 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete per previous consensus as WP:OR. Mangoe (talk) 22:49, 24 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. This is a useful article, as shown by its Page view statistics - 2322 views in Sept.2011 (70 per day) and 2807 so far in Oct.2011 (over 110 per day). So some readers are consulting it, presumably as a guide to historically important papers and books in chemistry. There was no community consensus to delete the biology article, but certain editors kept repeating that it was OR, and one administrator deleted the article unilaterally. Yes, the article could be improved, but that can be said of most Wikipedia articles. If you disagree with one selection, perhaps it can be removed, but to delete the whole article is very demotivating to those editors who have worked to produce a good list, and a disservice to the numerous readers who would consult the article if it remains. Dirac66 (talk) 23:44, 24 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per Dirac66. This is a poor nomination, based on a deletion conclusion that has been disputed and the article is now being improved in the incubator. As Lambiam indicates, it was followed by a whole set of AfDs all of which have not resulted in the lists being deleted. They did result in the Science Pearls Project being revitalized and I am sure this list will be improved as a result. One issue was the absence of sources saying that listing publications is important. I added some sources of this kind to the talk page, but they have not yet been used on the list itself. I am sure more sources can be found. --Bduke (Discussion) 00:10, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Nom provides no evidence that this is WP:OR. This list meets WP:NOTESAL notability criteria with this source Bibliography of Chemistry and this source Bibliographies of bibliographies of chemistry. Ill-concieved and unsupported nomination. --Mike Cline (talk) 00:27, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep It has all been said before. I have added several general references for the list to comply with WP:NOTESAL. RockMagnetist (talk) 01:02, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - clearly a notable topic as per the references listed. LadyofShalott 01:41, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy Keep This is extreemly notable and encyclopedic, no guidelines are violated, and WP:GNG is fully met, from a scholarly standpoint this is a useful tool for beginer chemists. – Phoenix B 1of3 (talk) 03:34, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. I'm wondering why this is even nominated for deletion. This is a very important topic with historical and technical significance. It will be a disservice to Wikipedia readers if this is deleted. PolicarpioM (talk) 07:37, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - I don't think that getting e.g. numbers like 'number of articles citing a paper' is OR, and the top-ranking articles in that ranking could be deemed 'important'. --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:42, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • It could be argued that this list should be trimmed to include only historically important works, and that the current version of the list is overly inclusive. But I reject the argument that the list as a whole should not exist. Keep. DS (talk) 13:14, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:15, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science pearls-related deletion discussions. RockMagnetist (talk) 16:08, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep It is not original research. The word "important" is clearly defined. Not liking the name doesn't make for a valid reason to delete an article. We had this discussion many times before. Dream Focus 01:10, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep – As a useful WP:SETINDEX article, which improves the Wikipedia project by improving the browsing and navigation of articles. Northamerica1000(talk) 11:00, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep a lot of relevant objective scientific information. We can't have it lost because it does not fit well in the mental categories of a few. GrandPhilliesFan (talk) 17:41, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all such articles like this should be deleted as "important" is subjective.Curb Chain (talk) 05:38, 29 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, just suggest a change of name. When it was just called "List of publications in chemistry", it was clear that normal wikipedia criteria of notability were to be used. I am happy to change all these lists back to that format, but that can be discussed elsewhere such as the Science Pearls Project. We do not delete when a move can fix the problem. Some, of course, do not think "important" is subjective in this context. We just need sources that say it is. Dream Focus also deals with this issue above. --Bduke (Discussion) 06:19, 29 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, "important" is not clearly defined, as evidenced by the repeated attempts to delete these articles.Curb Chain (talk) 14:34, 30 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fortunately, "important" is clearly defined, which is why these articles are almost always kept.
  • Some reasons why a particular publication might be regarded as important:
  • Topic creator – A publication that created a new topic
  • Breakthrough – A publication that changed scientific knowledge significantly
  • Influence – A publication which has significantly influenced the world or has had a massive impact on the teaching of chemistry.
See? Right there at the top of the article. Hopefully the closing administrator will see that too. Dream Focus 15:06, 30 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Inclusion in this article is based upon original research. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:19, 30 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Admittedly, the word Important is subjective but not meaningless. I would suspect the average reader of wikipedia would not be confused by its meaning or context in this article. The lead in this article does establish a context of importance by giving the word much more explicit contextual meaning. Something all good list leads should do. You claim inclusion is based on OR, but I am not sure what you mean by that. The list topic (if not explicitly) is clearly notable which is really the only necessary criteria for the list to exist. Individual entries are indeed subject to verifiability, and if their importance to chemistry (based on the lead criteria) cannot be established by sources, they shouldn't be in the article. But your are claiming (I guess) that the whole list is OR. That needs explaining as merely tossing out the OR argument doesn't help us decide here. What about this is OR? For example, the importance to chemistry of the first entry The Skeptical Chymist is well supported by sources, so how can that be considered OR? --Mike Cline (talk) 16:37, 30 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - while non-constructive debates like this are being initiated, Mike Cline is drafting a WikiProject for Bibliographies. It is very likely that this and related pages will soon be renamed bibliographies. RockMagnetist (talk) 16:22, 30 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep sufficient sources for the inclusion criteria. The decision in biology was an anomaly, and will be corrected , but just how it will be corrected willl depend on Mike's work. DGG ( talk ) 04:20, 31 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A suggestion

It would seem to me that the only particularly useful standard here would be to list the publications that we generally recognize as reliable sources. Therefore I would like to suggest that we consider moving all of these lists into Wikipedia space as reliability guidelines. Mangoe (talk) 12:15, 31 October 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.
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