List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation – Overturn to no consensus. The closer's methodology essentially boiled down to discarding !votes that did not address the central issue of WP:NOR and then counting the !votes (since the closer is not meant to be a decider of which of two policy-based arguments is correct, but rather which represents the dominant view of participants). This is a fine methodology, but consensus at this DRV is that the closer erred in concluding that there were only two valid "keep" !votes. It was pointed out that there were several other "keep" !voters who did in fact explicitly discuss the NOR angle; secondly, it has been argued that WP:NLIST is in fact a valid counter to NOR, since it establishes that the concept of the list is not fundamentally flawed and sets a very high burden for the "delete" side to meet (namely WP:TNT). Because of how lopsided the !vote count was in the end, it is not sufficient for "endorse" !voters to simply point out that some of the "keep" !votes, or even a significant proportion of them, did not address the reason for deletion; in fact, discarding half of the "keep" !votes would not be sufficient to find a consensus to delete. Overall, I find a consensus that there were enough valid "keep" !votes to prevent a result to delete. On the other hand, this DRV has not found the NOR arguments to be conclusively refuted by the "keep" side, so this is a textbook "no consensus" close. King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:05, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The following is an archived debate of the deletion review of the page above. Please do not modify it.
This discussion had six delete !votes and seventeen keep !votes, including the last sixteen !votes in a row. There is room for closers to apply WP:NOTVOTE within reason, but to apply such an extreme against-the-numbers close here, there would have to be evidence of vote-stacking or an extraordinarily strong disparity in the quality of the arguments. Neither of those apply here—several of the keep !voters provided detailed, policy and guideline–based rationales for their position and every single !voter after them agreed. To say that the consensus of the community here is to delete is plainly incorrect. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 17:08, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn as nominator. This is a clear supervote, and the closer's dismissive attitude at their talk page gives me serious concern. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 17:08, 21 October 2021 (UTC)Refactored on reflection (diff). Although the close was deeply misguided and did not respect consensus, the closer was attempting to do the right thing and I don't think this reflects on their overall competency. 19:38, 21 October 2021 (UTC) [reply]
Overturn as there was obviously no consensus to delete. The close's reasoning was illogical as it first said that "we don't go by headcounts" and then, after discarding most of the !votes, it used a headcount. You can't have it both ways. If you're going by strength of argument then you consider only the arguments. If you're going by headcount, then you do just that. So, far as the argument goes, the close conceded in conclusion that the topic was viable; they just didn't like that version. But, as the article has a huge history of over 1500 versions over 15 years, it is not sensible to delete that long history which may well have contained better versions. Andrew🐉(talk) 17:46, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Contrary to the nominator's assertion, WP:NOTVOTE is not something closers can choose to apply at their discretion, it's a fundamental part of how every single close is supposed to be made. Per our WP:CONSENSUS policy, Consensus is ascertained by the quality of the arguments given on the various sides of an issue, as viewed through the lens of Wikipedia policy. In principle, it doesn't matter if it's one person versus a hundred if that one person makes an argument in line with policy and the one hundred don't. Rather, I say kudos to the closer for recognizing that comments in favour of keeping that do not address the argument for deletion do not carry weight. Far too often (including in the AfD in question) have I seen editors arguing for keeping something because it's notable when the argument put forth for deleting it is something else, such as being an improper WP:CONTENTFORK or violating WP:NOT. To put it another way: if there is consensus against deleting a page for WP:DELREASON A and separately consensus for deleting that same page for WP:DELREASON B, consensus is in fact in favour of deletion.Regardless of whether this was a good outcome (my preferred outcome would probably have been to change the scope), it was a good close (though unpopular, clearly), and a good precedent—deletion discussions should be about the arguments, not the number of adherents, and that means that the specific issues that have been raised during the discussion should be properly addressed by those who favour a different outcome. Overturning it would set a really bad precedent to the contrary. TompaDompa (talk) 18:03, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn The administrator who deleted the pages did not seem to carefully read through our explanations and arguments, in addition to not respecting a clear consensus to keep. Our explanations clearly and repeatedly refuted the arguments proposed for deletion, but the administrator chose to side with the one or two editors on the deletion side who continued repeating their own flawed arguments and, in my view, abusing/misinterpreting Wikipedia policies. As I have explained repeatedly in the deletion page that there is no original research or synthesis, as every entry in the list is confirmed by at least one reliable source. Notions like "academic affiliations" is universally well-defined, not made up by us. Universities have their own freedom not to use this universal definition but adopt their subjective criteria when they claim their own Nobel laureates, which has nothing to do with us. We are perfectly neutral. Editors like Ber31 also repeatedly explained these points in the deletion page, but the administrator simply ignored our explanations. Hence, the consensus to "keep" is clear and the administrator's "deletion" decision must be overturned. Minimumbias (talk) 18:23, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to add a further comment: The administrator who deleted the pages only quoted the NOR policy and claimed that many editors who supported "Keep" did not directly respond to claim of NOR violation. This is plainly wrong. Editors like Ber31 and myself gave extensive explanations to prove we were not violating the policy. Several other editors like Gah4 and Tiredmeliorist also pointed out that there were no new conclusions reached, hence we did not violate NOR. Editors like Andrew and Mysterymanblue also responded to the NOR in their own ways, for example the latter said that "My response to the first concern is that every list and institution uses different criteria for what counts, so we should use the most expansive definition of affiliation out there." Other editors also stated that any argument they would use had been used by others. Thus, the fact is, we have many editors who supported "Keep" and who also responded to the NOR claim. The administrator either chose not to recognize this fact, or did not read the discussion carefully. Finally, the administrator did not ever explain how he/she still thought, after seeing our careful explanations and a majority vote of "keep", that we still violated NOR, as explained by Goldsztajn in the administrator's Talk Page [1].Minimumbias (talk) 19:25, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Closer's comment: As explained in the closure, I closed the AfD based only on the opinions that discussed the argument for deletion: that the article is supposedly OR. In my view, if an article is credibly alleged to fail a core policy such as WP:NOR, opinions that ignore this argument altogether are no better than mere votes, which we routinely disregard. If OR is the issue at hand, an argument such as "keep because it's notable" makes no more sense than "keep because the sky is blue". Even if there were local consensus in this AfD to disregard the OR issue because people like the article or think it's useful, that cannot be determinative. Local consensus cannot derogate a core policy. It can determine that the core policy is not violated, but to do so it needs to engage with the application of the core policy to the article at issue, and most "keep" opinions here did not. I stand by my closure. Sandstein 18:41, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You are ignoring the fact that the primary keep argument, that the list meets WP:NLIST, was an implicit response to the OR argument for deletion. The main criterion of NLIST, has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources, exists as a barrier against original research. Nearly every list on Wikipedia draws from multiple sources, in plenty of cases one for each entry; to call that SYNTH/OR would be an extreme interpretation of policy. You don't personally have to fully agree with that view, but in a consensus-driven project, the fact that sixteen editors in a row did should have carried weight. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 19:15, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No. It is possible that a topic is notable because it has been covered by reliable sources (as this topic undoubtedly has been), but that the contents of our article about this topic are not supported by these sources and are therefore OR. That's why I wrote that the article can be restored if this can be done in a form that resolves the OR issues. Sandstein 21:31, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Alalch Emis laid out very well below the difference between OR issues that justify a tag and OR issues that justify deletion. You are acknowledging that the topic is notable and could merit an article, so that means your close was per WP:TNT. I very much disagree with you about whether the problems in the article were so bad as to merit TNT (content writing is the hardest task on Wikipedia), but more importantly, it's not your or my call to make. It was a question of editorial judgement for the AfD !voters, and your job as closer was to assess the consensus they reached. "Sixteen !voters in a row came down on side A of a question of editorial judgement, but I agree with side B" isn't an assessment of consensus; it's a quintessential supervote. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 04:47, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) Sandstein many admins, on seeing such a disconnect between the issues the participants were discussing and the basis on which they felt it was necessary to close the decision, have chosen to relist with a specific note to that effect. You didn't do so in this case. Why not? Jclemens (talk) 21:32, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Relists are intended to address insufficient participation. That was not an issue here. Sandstein 22:26, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sandstein So, in retrospect, might it not have been a slightly less drama-inducing option to actually relist with a comment to the effect of "OK, so consensus is that it's not a non-encyclopedic cross-categorization, but we still don't have the OR argument addressed well enough"? I don't know why I bother to phrase that as a question: of course it would have been, and should have been. Your approach, even if arguably within administrator discretion, was sub-optimal in looking at alternatives to deletion and gaining consensus from participants. A good administrator crafts a contentious close on a basis that everyone understands and endorses, even if they disagree with the outcome. This was a missed opportunity, regardless of how this DRV is closed. Please learn from it. Jclemens (talk) 00:56, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) Endorse I've read the discussion and come to the same conclusion as Sandstein: almost all of the keep votes say that the list is notable without making any attempt to refute the original-research argument, and thus were properly discounted in determining whether there was consensus that the article is original research. * Pppery *it has begun... 18:43, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn Closer is not applying WP:NOR properly in a deletion context when he bases a consensus to delete on what he reads as implicit consensus (failure to refute prima facie arguments) that there is OR in the article. To delete because of OR would mean that the subject / list topic as judged by it's title (and therefrom implicit reasonably formulated scope) is an original creation. Participants said that this cross-categorization is not an original creation, when they cited NLIST "because similar list exists in X (book, website, etc.)".Closer discounted such arguments saying that non-notability is not the reason for which deletion is requested, and that instead the nomination was formed around a WP:NOR argument. This could have been a good analysis in some other case but here it is not. If this is a notable list topic, how can it be OR already at the base level of the list topic? Notability of a list as argued here by keep advocates implies that someone else already created a list of this sort, so NLIST being (hypothetically) fulfilled for this list topic would neutralize the concern that it is an original creation. Further, it being fulfilled, but there still being an OR problem, would mean we are no longer looking for OR at the level of the list topic (which is relevant for deletion), but at the level of specific content issues in the article, however systematic and terrible they may be (which is generally not relevant for deletion).From this it looks like the delete NOR arguments and keep NLIST arguments were reasonably mutually responsive. So pro-NLIST comments should not have been discounted. When the comments that shouldn't have been discounted are not, it proceeds that there was no consensus to delete. I don't like the DRV nom's comments about the closer, they are over the top. /deprecated/ — Alalch Emis (talk) 18:50, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Participants said that this cross-categorization is not an original creation, when they cited NLIST "because similar list exists in X (book, website, etc.)". I think the key word here is similar, which was a point brought up during the WP:AfD by XOR'easter: Establishing notability of a group requires references about that grouping, not a somewhat-related one. I'd argue that what we're looking at is an equivocation problem that has muddied the water considerably. I brought that up during the AfD: It's actually possible to construct a valid list with this title: a list of Nobel laureates by their university affiliation at the time they received the Nobel Prize. That list would not be novel, because sources do actually list Nobel laureates that particular way. But it would not be a different version of this list, it would be a fundamentally different list altogether.TompaDompa (talk) 19:25, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If it's possible to construct a valid list with the title, and there's at least a little bit of content in the article that isn't pure garbage, deletion, as in a real delete, which was done, is not the way forward. Return to draft could be good. Incongruence between the "formal subject" (as denoted by title) and "material subject" (what's really written in the article) is NOT solved by deletion, unless literally everything needs to be deleted as OR (or for whatever other reason) and the article practically wouldn't exist anymore — Alalch Emis (talk) 19:39, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, I certainly wouldn't be opposed to turning it into a draft, but I don't think it would have been reasonable to have closed the discussion that way. TompaDompa (talk) 19:49, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think anyone argued for draftification, so closing the discussion as "draftify" would have been out of line. XOR'easter (talk) 20:45, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Very well said. Regarding your last sentence, I refactored my !vote on reflection. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 19:41, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn I don't think the close is a fair summary of the discussion. Two main arguments were advanced for deleting the list: that it contains original research, and that it is an unencyclopedic cross-categorisation. Most of the Keep comments focused on refuting the latter, and that argument has now been thoroughly shredded. However there is a large degree of judgement in deciding whether something should be deleted as original research, and indeed in deciding whether something is original research in the first place. Containing original research is not itself a valid reason to delete something, either the topic needs to be fundamentally OR or the article should be so bad that we should blow it up and start over. The first condition clearly doesn't apply here because there are third party sources which can be used to populate lists like this, so we're down to deciding how bad the article is, and that's very much a judgement call for the participants rather than the closer. Some of the Delete supporters appear to be arguing that the list is OR unless it's entirely referenced to a single source, which seems a rather extreme interpretation to me. Hut 8.5 19:46, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse- I agree with Pppery and the closer. The whole conversation, besides the guff about cross-categorisation, was basically this: "the list is founded on original research". "keep- notable". "that's nice, nobody said anything about notability, it's OR from top to bottom". "But notable!!". If the entire article had been a copyvio or an abusive tirade against it subject, would any amount of "keep notable keep notable keep notable" win the day? Nope. Same basic principle here. Disclosure: I did not participate in the discussion except to lament once again that prefacing personal attacks with the word "keep" seems to exempt them from the WP:NPA policy. ReykYO! 19:59, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn The first reason given for deletion by the nominator was "trivial cross-categorisation". I questioned if the school they went to mattered, and the response was that the official biographies of these people always listed it, so I went ahead and voted it should be kept. This is not a "trivial cross-categorisation", as the nominator said, but a valid one. As for the second reason for the nomination, the original research seems that someone didn't update the list to the proper number of Nobel laureates by university affiliation, some of them outdated and thus incorrect. Easily fixed. No reason to delete the article based on that. Basic counting is not original research. Overwhelming people said it was a notable topic, a valid list article, and the article should be kept. DreamFocus 20:08, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That wasn't the argument for calling the list OR. The problem wasn't that any information was outdated, but that judgments were being made using invented criteria for what counts as "affiliation" and what doesn't. That layer of judgment on top of the facts is fine for a research project, but not for here. XOR'easter (talk) 20:45, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There are plenty of lists on Wikipedia with subjective criteria; see Category:Dynamic lists. We don't delete the list of people from Manchester just because it's not precisely clear how long you need to have lived in Manchester to be from there. In these situations, we should try to define criteria more precisely and put that in an editnotice, but it is a weak argument for deletion, and it's certainly not so overwhelmingly strong that it justifies going against an overwhelming numerical majority and trend for keeping. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 21:32, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse as a participant; the closer correctly identified that many of the "keep" !votes did not engage with the rationales for deletion. XOR'easter (talk) 20:45, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn This closure is highly inappropriate. I'd first like to point to what Wikipedia:Deletion Policy says on when original research merits article deletion: Articles that cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources, including neologisms, original theories and conclusions, and hoaxes. It does not say that all articles that contain original research must be deleted. Certainly, the original research must be deleted, but the article may stay if it could "possibly be attributed to reliable sources." Thus, deleters who argued on the original research front had to show not only that the article contained original research, but that extent of original research was so great that the article could not have reasonably been fixed. I therefore believe that the closer incorrectly concluded that prima facie evidence that the article contained original research was a sufficient reason for deletion.
The closer also appears to have missed a number of arguments that directly addressed the original research claim. The closer said "For the most part, only two people attempted to refute the NOR arguments - Minimumbias and Ber31." However, I directly addressed these claims in my !vote, which the closer apparently did not see: I also will note that, while primary sources are used heavily in the article, this seems to be more out of convenience than anything else. There is surely a reliable secondary source for every Nobel prize ever issued. Since the secondary sources do exist, this article is more in need of a clean up than a deletion. I believe that, at the least, this indicates that the closer did not consider the entirety of the discussion.
The fact that notability arguments did not directly use the term "original research" is not enough for them to be discounted either. As a reminder, the relevant portion of the deletion policy says the following: Articles that cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources, including neologisms, original theories and conclusions, and hoaxes. In other words, original research-based deletions are a subset of deletions based on a lack of reliable secondary sources, that is, deletions based on non-notability. By asserting that the subject of an article is notable, commenters asserted that the article could possibly be attributed to reliable sources, and thus that deletion was out of order.
Some have said that, even if a hundred people made arguments not based in policy and one made an argument in line with policy, the one-percent superminority would prevail. This is clearly contrary to the spirit of WP:IAR, which provides for flexible rules that can be bent to make the encyclopedia better. Even if deletion here was mandated by policy - which it isn't - such a strong consensus in favor of keeping this article to fulfill Wikipedia's mission of covering notable issues would overcome the voices in favor of deletion. Mysterymanblue 20:48, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think you may have missed or misunderstood a significant portion of the WP:OR arguments. A lot of them centered around the criteria for the list being WP:OR, as opposed to the individual entries. TompaDompa (talk) 21:12, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I did address that in my original comment at the discussion: because every list uses different criteria, we should use the broadest criteria and separate by type of affiliation. As others have pointed out, there are plenty of reliable secondary sources that provided a lists of Nobel laureates based on affiliation. Mysterymanblue 21:35, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. Closers are supposed to assess the strength of policy-based arguments, not merely count votes. That is exactly what the closer did in this case. It is a bolder move than I would have likely made, but I think that's an admirable thing. To overturn would be to move towards mob rule instead of policy-based consensus in deletion discussions. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:07, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
EndorseThe deletion arguments are that this is afoul of NOT (a lot of things can be non-encyclopedic, even if they happen to have sources) and NOR (not because the subject cannot be sourced [that would be fail of V], but because the way the subject is treated is essentially a novel construction, which cannot be found as is in sources, and which is in fact often in disregard with the sources because they don't match the OR construction of the list: something that is first published on Wikipedia is by definition WP:OR). No amount of "but it's notable" and "I like it" is going to change that, and no amount of relitigating is going to change that. None of the overturns or of the keeps address the core delete argument, or the OR construction of the list (when the list openly says stuff like "the University's website has number X, but here, because [OR reason], we have Y", there's not much room for ambiguity). Saying "overturn because vote count" is not only bad precedent, but is fundamentally at odds with every part of Wikipedia policy and longstanding practice. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 21:16, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You can think you've refuted something as much as you want, but your argument does not in any way address the fact the counts given by the article do not match with the sources, are based on criteria which are different from the sources, and more importantly, the whatever the criteria, if there is no source which points out that "[Nobel winner A] is affiliated with [institution B]", then we can't include it because taking "A won a Nobel" and "A studied at B [at some - often unrelated - point in their life]" together is the textbook example of WP:SYNTH. The closer obviously judged that your argument on the OR aspect of this was not in the majority. Stop re-litigating. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 14:20, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Different universities use different subjective criteria to count Nobel affiliates, but we cannot do that on this website because of Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. The only "criteria" that can be used on the list is the universally accepted definition of "academic affiliation". You are not getting these points. RC: ..taking "A won a Nobel" and "A studied at B [at some - often unrelated - point in their life]" together is the textbook example of WP:SYNTH. I disagree. WP:SYNTH questions can be tricky, but IMO routine calculations do not count as WP:OR or WP:SYNT. Ber31 (talk) 14:44, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It cannot, by definition, be "routine calculations" if its "subjective". Routine calculations are by their very nature objective: nobody can argue that 5 x 3 = 15, or that 25 is 50% of 50. In any case, I'm not going to re-argue the AfD here any further: your position as regards OR was in the minority (despite you writing walls of text to defend it), and the rest of the keep arguments did not even attempt to address the issue, instead merely pointing at the red herring of the subject being notable. Any closer aware of our policies or even of basic argumentative logic knows that arguments which are off-topic or otherwise fail to get the point must be disregarded, and you do not show how the closer otherwise made a "clear error in judgement" (of the kind that would be necessary to overturn this) in determining the consensus of the arguments that actually addressed the relevant issues with the article. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 15:22, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@RandomCanadian: "nobody can argue that 5 x 3 = 15, or that 25 is 50% of 50" hmmmm. --JBL (talk) 20:18, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn per WP:NHC: "If the discussion shows that some people think one policy is controlling, and some another, the closer is expected to close by judging which view has the predominant number of responsible Wikipedians supporting it, not personally select which is the better policy." The fact that more editors spent time demolishing the non-encyclopedic cross-categorization demonstrates that the other argument(s) was not the controlling issue. Jclemens (talk) 21:18, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Very much, if not most, of the discussion was specifically on the OR issue. Whether some editors decided to ignore that entirely, and pile-on the "passes LISTN" votes (most of them don't have any significant argument, they're just unsupported assertions, hence "votes") after the fact, does not mean that WP:NOR (a fundamental policy) gets to be ignored at the expanse of WP:N (a guideline, which is specifically meant to avoid issues of WP:V and WP:NOR in articles) RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 21:24, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, actually, because they read your nomination and didn't feel like it was worth discussing, they inherently dismiss the NOR argument, as well they should have, because making the argument requires one to torture the sense of OR to include pretty much every list of notable elements. I mean, I'm not trying to be offensive here, but it's just a terrible argument that, if accepted in the way you presented it, requires us to fundamentally rearchitect lists on Wikipedia. Jclemens (talk) 21:29, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The only thing that is incredibly tortured about OR here is your misapplication and your call to panic. Something that is based on an original methodology is OR even if it can be synthesised (in multiple original methods, as shown by the need for arguments about this on the talk page) from existing sources. Dismissing something without addressing the concerns (or by addressing a red herring, as many of those arguing for deletion point out) is not effective argumentation, and is an argument that a closer has every right to ignore. Claiming "but more people made the same repetitious and invalid argument" is not a reason to give that argument any more weight: otherwise we're openly encouraging canvassing and SPA disruption (because now, what prevents you from having an army of your friends come and argue the same flawed argument as you, if arguments are just counted?). WP:NOTAVOTE is there for a reason, and the overturns fail to provide a convincing argument why it should be ignored or why the closer was wrong. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 21:48, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
So you don't think you're wrong, I believe you are, but I'm not inclined to keep talking past each other, so I'm going to ignore the irrelevant part of your rebuttal (see what I did there?) and talk about the part I believe it is more helpful to engage with. First, socking is a red herring: any XfD is inherently compromised by socking, because socks are motivated by outcome and not restricted in tactics; they will continue to adapt, or not, to what they believe will achieve their desired ends. Second, I didn't write WP:NHC; to the best of my recollection, I haven't ever edited that page. If that's not what it's saying, what is that clause in policy for? Jclemens (talk) 22:18, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
WP:NHC is an advice page, not a policy or even a guideline. I'm not sure that all of it is particularly helpful advice, either (do we really want to invite disputes over who is a "responsible" editor, for example?). XOR'easter (talk) 22:52, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's also a bit ridiculous to claim that keep voters fixating on one comparatively minor issue because they couldn't answer the major one is evidence that the major one is irrelevant. What contorted thinking! ReykYO! 23:18, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The first and presumably major complaint in the deletion nomination was "non-encyclopedic cross categorization." If the latter, less important (in the mind of the nominator) concerns are less well addressed while the major complaint goes down in flames, and yet form the sole basis of the outcome against numerical input, that's a particularly odd way to read a discussion. Jclemens (talk) 00:49, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Then you are misreading my rationale, for clearly the two reasons are given equal status (as they should, both being breaches of Wikipedia policy, namely WP:NOT and WP:NOR). Nor do the keep !votes even address the NOT issue (something being covered in sources does not make it encyclopedic: WP:NOT is a stricter criteria than mere WP:N), much less the NOR one. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 00:59, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
We're not seriously considering chucking out arguments based on the order they were listed, are we? Imagine if someone provided a list of sources in some AfD or other and I insisted on flicking aside all but the first because obviously if they were important they'd have been listed first. I'd get shouted down and rightly so. Given that inclusionism usually relies on repetition and volume rather than content, this is a very interesting tactic to adopt. ReykYO! 12:37, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In this case, I think order does matter. To me, the first argument ("non-encyclopedic cross categorization") and the second one, that the cross categorization requires OR, are nearly the same argument. Both don't like the cross categorization because of a lack of sources. Both were shot down in the discussion because there are plenty of sources. If the NOR argument had been the leading sentence, then folks likely would have said "hey, here are the sources, your NOR argument is bogus" rather than "hey, here are the sources, your non-encyclopedic cross categorization argument is bogus." Hobit (talk) 10:10, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I (the one who wrote it, so should know what I meant) have told quite a couple of times that the order did not matter. Of course, you're free to misinterpret it however you want, I have no control over that. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 01:48, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn addressing the closure in its own terms, it failed: by (rightly) rejecting a head count and asserting OR as the primary determinant, by that very framing the closer needed to explicitly demonstrate a weighing of arguments around OR assertions, which was entirely absent. On their talk page and here, the closer has not demonstrated a reasoning for their acceptance of the OR assertions - repeating policy no one disagrees with is different than explaining how the closer determined the OR argumentation was correct if not by head count. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 21:38, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn The !vote was clearly in favor of keeping, just because all the delete voters used the same acronym and the keep voters didn't doesn't invent consensus. It's not clear what WP:NOR violations existed in the article, either from the close or the arguments. The stronger arguments to delete aren't even based on NOR. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 22:11, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the similar discussion on the Fields Medal article, I see two possible causes of OR. The first is, roughly, "What is the University of Paris?", and the second is "when is someone affiliated with a university where they neither received an academic degree nor had a full-time teaching/research position"? I am absolutely certain that both can be resolved without deleting the article. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 22:32, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Discussions are not votes: discussions are supposed to find consensus by having editors argue the merits of each position - clearly, the only argument that was had here was about the lack of merit of keeping something that was fundamentally original in conception: whether a dozen people added unargued/poorly argued "keeps" (which were rightly ignored as missing the point) does not give their non-argument extra weight. "just because all the delete voters used the same acronym and the keep voters didn't doesn't invent consensus" is essentially the "dismiss something without actually refuting it" argument, which is not convincing, either. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 22:39, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Except the various "discounted" votes based on notability were clearly arguing that the title concept is not fundamentally original. Also, did I find the correct OR concerns? If it is such a clear policy case that there are OR violations to ignore a 17-6 vote, it MUST NOT be difficult to identify what the OR concerns specifically are. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 22:52, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It wouldn't be so hard if this hasn't been hopelessly bombarded by useless keep votes. "notability is not inherited; and disregarding that entirely, it is not a reason to keep a page which is based on original criteria (which, more often that not, match few if any of the reliable sources on the topic) for its content." (quote, myself) is a typical, simple and concise example of this obvious OR concern which has not been addressed by any of the keep votes. This is also obvious from the extensive description of criteria in the lead (inevitably, with no source which supports the conclusion given in Wikivoice) [see archive link below]. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 23:12, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment, could the article be temporarily restored while the review is ongoing please? Vpab15 (talk) 22:35, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's not that it "isn't always followed"; it's that
Undeletion is on request, and nobody had requested it yet; and
As mentioned, because the article had in excess of 5,000 revisions, steward intervention would be required to delete it again if it were fully restored. I think an admin can restore it, though – and we could certainly restore the top few revisions, although this would risk a CC-By-SA breach by not having full history. Stifle (talk) 16:00, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If it had too many revisions that an admin couldn't undelete it without steward intervention (which is what I think you mean), then that argues strongly against deleting it right away on the basis of a contested AfD. Jclemens (talk) 00:43, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse I think the closer did an admirable job in deciding delete for this discussion. Throughout the discussion the main crux of the nomination was not suitably addressed or refuted by keep voters. It takes quite a lot of courage and is heartening to see a closer engage in the actual arguments and policy rather than just doing a vote tally and I think this should be applauded. (Disclosure: I engaged in the discussion on the delete side). I would also add that most Overturn voters have not mentioned the closer's comments that the list can be recreated if this can be done in a non-OR manner. Rather than fighting this here why not begin a non-OR version of this list? Vladimir.copic (talk) 23:14, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse I think the best outcome would have been to narrow the scope to only list the universities where the recipient was affiliated with at the time the prize was issued. So, to that end, I support allowing the article to be created with that narrow (and unchanging) scope. However, we must judge the reasonableness of the closer's decision. In this case, I think a delete close was bold, but justified under existing policies. The delete votes were grounded in policy while most of the keep votes were not. As for the question of OR, I think when a number on Wikipedia is in conflict with a list published by a primary source, there are inherent questions about verifiability. --Enos733 (talk) 23:33, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
#1 Using only where the subject was when the prize was awarded is a poor idea. Many people win awards for older work that they did someplace other than where they are right now. I'm guessing this isn't a topic you are hugely familiar with? #2 That would be just as "OR" as what we have, so the same (wrong-headed IMO) deletion arguments would apply. #3 The keep !votes largely cited policy quite well, showing that sources support the entries and the topic which is key to both the non-encyclopedic cross categorization argument and the WP:OR argument. Hobit (talk) 10:17, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn pretty bad close. Clearly a notable topic as there are plenty of sources and every fact is sourced. The argument made for deletion is that the structure of the page was original research. Many of our pages have a structure that is exactly that—-look at our article on the British Empire. I know of no book with the same structure or emphasis of topics. It’s based on decisions made by the editors of the page. This is true of many, and probably most, of our longer articles. If a small minority pushing that as an issue is enough to delete an article, that’s a lot of articles that could be deleted…. The closer just accepts the OR argument without question. It was countered many times. Common sense isn’t OR…. Hobit (talk) 23:37, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
1) You are relitigating the discussion 2) The OR argument is not about the structure of the page but about the content of it. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 00:39, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
1) No I'm not. (I too can make unsupported assertions. If you have a point you'd like to make, explain it. I can't read your mind. 2) Can you name one fact on the page that is OR? Hobit (talk) 01:36, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Since you're specifically asking for my opinion, here's an example that is obvious enough in itself: Harvard University, United States Total: 165 (Univ Count: 51)[8] - an article blatantly ignoring sources to instead substitute its own methodology is OR, entirely disregarding whether one thinks they LIKEIT, whether the subject fails NOT, whether it meets LISTN, or whichever other issue. Another obvious example is Barack Obama being listed for 3 different universities, based of course only on a biography of Obama - obvious SYNTH (in addition, clearly, none of them have any link with his Nobel, showing how this is indeed not just an OR issue but also a NOT issue of "two unrelated characteristics" [at least in this case]). This is also accurately reflected in the close: there's exactly nothing preventing you from making a non-OR version of this article. None of the keep arguments address the OR issue, so as Stalwart points out below, "arguments with invalid rationales should be disregarded", which was correctly done by the closer. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 02:36, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This is all very odd. Did B. Obama win a Nobel? Has he been affiliated with the three schools? If you don't like the sourcing, fine. But are you actually arguing any of those claims wrt Obama is false? Or that it takes "original research" to verify them? Again, the structure of the article can be argued to be OR I guess (but, again, that's true of many, if not most, of our articles). But the claims are not OR. And I'm honestly at a loss how your statements wrt Obama show "original research" in any way. Hobit (talk) 06:14, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I can't figure out how you don't consider this OR. Taking "A won a Nobel" and "A studied at B [at some - often unrelated - point in their life]" together and combining them into "[Nobel winner A] is affiliated with [institution B]" (as in the case of Obama) is the textbook example of WP:SYNTH. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 14:23, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, so you're arguing about the structure of the article yes? Are you claiming that for each person we'd need a source that mentions both things (they won the award and they were associated with these schools)? Or that we need sources that care about the intersection of the two topics generically? For the case you list, both exist of course, so I'm guessing you mean some third thing. Could you clarify? Maybe it's because I'm an academic, but I assure you when someone who had been in my department won a Nobel Prize, it was all over the local press and the specialized press related to his area. We still have a whole display up about him years later. I assure you, the schools he'd been at as a student and faculty member were mentioned in the vast majority of the articles. Hobit (talk) 21:19, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If this was as easy as you suggest, why are the numbers in the article fundamentally different from those of many other sources? Clearly, there are multiple different subjective criteria (is somebody who spent a short period for something entirely unrelated to the Nobel really "affiliated" with that institution?), hence this is not as easy as "A went to B, therefore he is affiliated to B", and this list is built on only one set of them (as it spends a great deal of time justifying itself in the lead), one which happens to disregard most sources on the matter. Something that disregards sources, that needs to justify its own original criteria, and that is not published in a form even remotely ressembling this anywhere outside of Wikipedia, is OR in all senses of the term. Anyway, this is the kind of argument that should go at AfD, not at DRV, so I'm done here. Cheers, RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 22:45, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn - sub-optimal close. There is no requirement that each argument contrary to the nomination should systematically refute each point made in said nomination. That would be especially redundant in cases like this, where the specific point the closer seems to be looking for was made (fairly comprehensively) by several editors very early in the discussion. Subsequent editors need not re-make that argument. The argument made in the close is exactly that; an argument. And a fairly articulate one at that. There was no urgency to close the discussion; it had not been relisted even once. Which suggests a supervote that should have been a contribution to the discussion, rather than a rationale for closing it. St★lwart111 00:31, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Relisting is not necessary when the discussion has been fairly extensive. There is a requirement each argument provide a valid reason. "It's notable" when the concern is "it's original research" (note: the original rationale does not even mention notability) is not a "valid reason". In fact, it's a textbook example of a red herring. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 00:39, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That's right, its not necessary, but its a better option than closing with a rationale like that. We're not talking about differentiating between valid or invalid rationales. Arguments with invalid rationales should be disregarded. But arguments with rationales that are simply different to the direction the closer would have liked the discussion to go are not the same thing. St★lwart111 01:22, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This seems to be more of an argument for relist than overturn though? Vladimir.copic (talk) 01:33, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It should have been, and I wouldn't object to the discussion being relisted now. But on the question of endorse or overturn, I remain of the opinion that this was a sub-optimal close and should be overturned. St★lwart111 07:40, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Relisting would not have been appropriate. The purpose of relisting is to obtain more input when a debate lacks participation or lacks policy-based arguments to the extent that it's impossible to determine a consensus. It's not correct to relist just to kick the can down the road for another week because you don't know how to close. Stifle (talk) 16:02, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, but the argument in the close (which is problematic in and of itself) is that there was a lack of policy-based arguments to address the particular things the closer was concerned about. By comparison to this close, and because this close was framed the way it was, relisting would have been a better course of action from this admin. And if the admin were to vacate his own close and relist the discussion instead (with a note specifying his concerns at that point in the discussion) that would be slightly out of process, but acceptable. To be clear, my view is simply "sub-optimal", not "worst close of all time". St★lwart111 01:54, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
the particular things the closer was concerned about OR issues were raised in the nomination and repeatedly mentioned by participants in the discussion, it's not as if Sandstein invented the issue! --JBL (talk) 17:06, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
WP:OR was mentioned many times, but never explained. Especially no showing reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources. It isn't so obvioius that the article reached any conclusions, it is just a list. Gah4 (talk) 23:28, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Whether or not that is true has nothing to do with my point. (It is an argument that perhaps someone could have made in the AfD, but that's not relevant here.) --JBL (talk) 23:44, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I think that's absolutely relevant. The closer seems to be concerned that issues relating to WP:NOR weren't addressed. But they were. That's plain to see from the discussion. In fact, they were addressed by some of the first contributors and dismissed. The then closer shifted the goalposts and retrospectively demanded that, "keep" arguments must directly address and attempt to refute these arguments for deletion in order to be given weight in the closure", which is total nonsense. There is no such requirement. The closer is free to hold that (incorrect and non-policy) view, and to express that view within the discussion, at which point it can be laughed at and summarily dismissed. But it is another thing entirely to use that (incorrect and non-policy) view as a basis for closing a discussion. St★lwart111 06:49, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It is not relevant to the specific point I was making. Sometimes closers make up issues not covered by the discussion (as here) and that's bad but it's absolutely not what happened here, and that's my point. I decline to take the role of opposition in the (completely separate) argument you are trying to have with me. --JBL (talk) 11:21, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not trying to have any sort of argument with you. You commented on my contribution. In fact, you commented on my response to someone else's question about my contribution. *shrug*. St★lwart111 23:34, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. University affiliation is a complicated question. Editors arguing in favor of keeping the article didn't grapple with the question of original research, but you have to in this case. I also can't see a justification for relisting the discussion. There was a full discussion and plenty for a closer to work with. For what it's worth, I think there's probably consensus that it passed LISTN, but that's somewhat beside the point. The nomination wasn't about that, it was about original research, and that point was never really rebutted. Mackensen(talk) 01:46, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn - It might be that WP:OR wasn't especially rebutted, but it also wasn't especially argued. I asked a few times, and never got a reply. It would be nice if WP:OR was black and white, but there is a lot of gray. Gah4 (talk) 03:25, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Clearly within an admin discretion to weigh what the participants are actually arguing and whether the arguments are supported by policy. Otherwise, deletion discussions could just be closed by a bot if all that is desired by some is a headcount. Zaathras (talk) 03:39, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn. User:Sandstein's decision to delete the page was unilateral. User:Urselius, who didn't participated in the AFD, also expressed his dissatisfaction on the Talk Page of Sandstein.[2] Six editors "voted" to delete the page, and seventeen editors "voted" to keep the page. The "keep" side provided detailed arguments based on policies of this website as to why the list shouldn't be deleted. User:Pppery:almost all of the keep votes say that the list is notable without making any attempt to refute the original-research argument, and thus were properly discounted in determining whether there was consensus that the article is original research. That is incorrect. User:Minimumbias and I repeatedly explained in that AFD why the list doesn't violate WP:NOR. Other editors on that AFD also pointed out that the list doesn't violate WP:NOR or WP:SYNTHESIS. User:Gah4 pointed out that the list doesn't violate WP:SYNTHESIS.[3]User:Andrew Davidson explained why the list doesn't violate WP:NOR.[4]Routine calculations do not count as original research. User:Tiredmeliorist also explained why the list doesn't violate WP:SYNTHESIS or WP:NOR.[5] In that list, every entry had at least one reliable source. The list is deleted, so it is extremely difficult for people who never participated in the discussion to see how the list really was, and do a detailed review. Detailed analysis is a difficult job. When people are making decisions under uncertainty or imperfect information, they use intuition rather than reason while making decisions, and people also tend to make their decisions on the basis of what others are saying–not on the basis of their own detailed analysis. The list was enormous, and it had plenty of vital information. All of that is lost. It will take a big effort to recreate that kind of list. Lots of editors devoted time and energy on that list. All it takes is one bad decision by an admin to destroy the efforts of so many editors over so many years. Ber31 (talk) 04:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Please refrain from canvassing by pinging only people who made keep arguments you deemed to be persuasive. * Pppery *it has begun... 04:13, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's kind of ironic that you pinged me in an edit in which you explicitly said I am not pinging anyone ... * Pppery *it has begun... 13:26, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Pinging" wasn't intentional. Got it? Please don't make false accusation. Ber31 (talk) 17:09, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think there was also some canvassing here unfortunately. Vladimir.copic (talk) 04:29, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"If we don't keep this why should I even edit at all?" is not the reason why I am retiring from Wikipedia. I have explained my reasons for retirement on User talk:Minimumbias. Ber31 (talk) 06:19, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I am quite grateful to Ber31 for pinging me bc I only get a short time on WP each day, lol. Sorry to see you go, but the recent deletionist frenzy over lists is enough to wear out the best of us. I think the AfD is too powerful a tool -- imagine if we could create articles as easily as they delete them? The AfD decision here is case in point to such intemperate power. -Tiredmeliorist (talk) 14:58, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I will retire after the final decision on this list is made. Your arguments are great! Ber31 (talk) 17:09, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse The closer did an admirable job using their discretion in deciding delete for this discussion. They ignored a blind head count in favor of keep and focused on the core of each sides arguments. Delete voters (I was one) saw the article for what it was: a truly massive (over 800 references - more then the World War II article) WP:SYNTHESIS of WP:OR, complete with countless unsourced notes about caveats regarding the entries. Keep voters arguments amounted to Nobel Prize's are notable or have coverage, so any article on them was justified as notable. The closing admin used their discretion to enforce basic article standards and deserves praise for their courage, not complaints at DR. Newshunter12 (talk) 04:18, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There were multiple !votes in the style of "NLIST because similar list exists in X (book, website, etc.)". This is not, like you say, "Nobel prize is notable", but "this list topic is notable". — Alalch Emis (talk) 06:01, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Restore page as a draft. I feel the topic might be notable and my vote was somewhat brusque from having to slog through many similar list AfDs that clearly weren’t notable (like “Victoria Crosses by School”) but keeping the page off the mainspace until it is proven to be notable and brought up to Wikipedia standards is the right thing to do in the spirit of WP:TNT. Dronebogus (talk) 06:17, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In my opinion, I think keeping this as draft probably would encourage the OR that led to this situation. The list obviously needs to be paired down greatly and I don't think these two pages being there as a base will assist with this (remember that before it was split in two this was the longest WP article). Sources with lists of Nobel laureates are easy to find and a new non-OR page would not be hard to construct. I feel that this would better support a TNT. Vladimir.copic (talk) 06:31, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn - for two reasons: 1) it is a useful comparative Wikipedia page, it is of equal utility as such pages that show 'Nobel laureates by country of origin', 2) there would have to be very cogent and compelling reasons for the overturning of a very definite majority view, and going against Wikipedia policy on consensus, and this was not evident to me. Urselius (talk) 07:52, 22 October 2021 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Urselius (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. (title=User_talk%3AUrselius&type=revision&diff=1051135371&oldid=1048109965) diff) NOTE I was alerted that a deletion discussion had come and gone without my knowledge, when the 'executive deletor' started flagging its removal on pages that I was actively curating. I then looked at the closed discussion and wrote on the 'deletor's' talk page to complain. I was then informed of this present discussion by an editor. I do not usually involve myself in wikipolitics, so without the editor's kind flagging, I would have been unaware. I think that I had shown sufficient involvement and interest in this topic, before I was informed of this pertinent discussion, that the accusation of having been canvassed has no merit or substance, and is an expression of mere partizanship. Urselius (talk) 08:18, 25 October 2021 (UTC) On reflection, I also think that the editor who added the above accusation is not abiding by Wikipedia norms of behaviour by not signing it, I would class this as underhanded. Urselius (talk) 08:24, 25 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There seems to be an impasse between two legitimate consensuses: that the article in its original state was too hampered by persistent WP:OR issues to maintain, and that the article should have been kept as notable. But I agree that the consensus seemed more in favor of “keep”, without obvious “keep: nooo don’t delete it’s WP:INTERESTING” brigading like you normally see in these controversial discussions, and was surprised by the closer’s decision. AfD isn’t cleanup, even for the most severe issues— in such cases it would be better to relocate a page to draftspace or simply gut the article and start from the salvageable bits. Dronebogus (talk) 08:27, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn to keep. On first reading I agreed with Sandstein, but on second, I believe that he erred on this occasion.OR is about sources, and SYNTH is very specifically about sources. To make the case for SYNTH, you say: "There are no sources that discuss this subject as a topic in its own right." Such a statement can only be overcome by producing the sources that do discuss it as a topic in its own right.In my view, it is possible to completely refute a !vote by producing evidence that proves that it is in error. When user A says, "There are no sources", and users B C and D agree with A, and user E says "There are sources and here are links to them", it is my position that the !votes of users A, B, C and D are refuted. The closer can, and should, give such !votes zero weight. This is what we mean when we say that AfD is not a vote. And when that has been done, it is not necessary for subsequent !voters to address the now-refuted argument. Weighing the !votes in the light of these principles, I get to a result diametrically opposite to Sandstein's.—S MarshallT/C 09:01, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@S Marshall, this view presupposes that the OR arguments were in fact conclusively refuted by the "keep" side, and that I as closer should have recognized that and acted on it. In my view, that would have been supervoting: the OR discussion (among the few users that did engage in it) devolved into very long walls of text, and it would have been arbitrary to assign "victory" in this debate to one side or the other. Reasonable editors can disagree on what OR is. But among those who did engage in the OR discussion, rough consensus was that the article was in fact OR, and that's what I acted on.
Besides, if the OR argument is (as I understand it) that the content is not in fact supported by the cited sources, or that the cited sources are used in an inadmissibly synthetic manner, then that is not the kind of argument that can be refuted by "There are sources and here are links to them". It's not in dispute that sources exist; what's in dispute is how they are used. Sandstein 15:17, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The reason why I differ from RandomCanadian is because he has pointed out one instance where sources were used inappropriately. This is fixable. It provides grounds to edit the article, but I'm not able to connect that with a need to delete it.
The reason why I differ from Sandstein is because the sources cited during the debate show that an acceptable article with this title could exist. Other editors did object during the debate that while the sources exist, they weren't used appropriately anywhere in the article; I understand this as a WP:TNT argument. My view would be that TNT requires a supporting consensus, and I can't see it there.—S MarshallT/C 16:21, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
TNT definitely requires supporting consensus, but also, TNT is not the only way to resolve intractable systematic problems in an article. There's BRD, DR, RFC, etc... — Alalch Emis (talk) 18:26, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Sandstein: You've stated "that the article is supposedly OR". But at no point do you identify in what way the article is OR. And those arguing for delete seem to be all over the place in *what* OR there is, but my sense is that "completely original listing criteria at the start of the article" is probably where many of the !votes for deletion because of OR are at. Is that the WP:OR argument you felt wasn't refuted here? Hobit (talk) 12:31, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's not my job as closer to make one or the other side's argument for them, such as by identifying how the article is allegedly OR. My job is to determine whether there are prima facie credible policy-based arguments for and against deletion, and weigh them accordingly. So as not to cast a supervote, I have to exhibit some restraint in this regard: whether the article is in fact OR or not is for AfD participants to determine, not for me as the closer. But what I can do, and did do here, is throwing out all opinions that do not even attempt to engage with the argument for deletion and are therefore functionally equivalent to pure votes. That also applies to opinions that have a basis in another policy or guideline, such as notability: whether a topic is notable or not has nothing to do with whether or not this article is OR. Sandstein 15:00, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Except many of the "Keep" voters feel there is no valid WP:OR argument at all, and didn't engage with it. If you can't even identify the argument, how can you discount those editors' opinions? You appear to be saying that you had to close this way because the vote of people with the magic word "NOR" favored deletion, which is an embarassingly bad argument; if you have some other reason you will need to explain it better. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 15:15, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If those expressing "keep" opinions (there are no "voters", AfD is not a vote) had been of the view that there is no valid WP:OR argument at all, they should have said so, and said why. I'm not a mind reader. Sandstein 15:20, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The !voters are not mind-readers either. The nomination started "Textbook example of a trivial cross-categorisation of two entirely unrelated characteristics...". There is no mention of OR in this while the reference to OR at the very end comes across as just a WP:VAGUEWAVE. So, how are the editors in the discussion supposed to know what single issue the closer is going to seize on to the exclusion of everything else? Andrew🐉(talk) 16:30, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Since you're persistently attempting to misread my mind, and since I've quite clearly stated it already, I consider both NOT and NOR to be equally valid reasons, and I might as well point you to the fact there's a long quote which explains how this is indeed OR, a quote which you seem to be blind to. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 16:46, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I am going to continue to play confused. If you're not closing based on the vote, and you're not assessing the strength of arguments, and you aren't casting a SUPERVOTE ... how did you decide to close this discussion? User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 16:27, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Serves little purpose and as a block of information can be created faster and better offsite. scope_creepTalk 12:59, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - The AFD was difficult to review and close because there was too much back-and-forth discussion. This DRV is now becoming comparably difficult to participate in because there is too much back-and-forth discussion. Robert McClenon (talk) 15:31, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse, a good and courageous closure giving appropriate weight to recommendations rather than mere head-counting. Stifle (talk) 15:56, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment in addition to all the other concerns, the closing statement's suggestion that only two keep voters (Minimumbias and Ber31) addressed NOR concerns is factually wrong. At least three other editors (@Andrew Davidson, Mysterymanblue, and Tiredmeliorist:) explicitly addressed NOR in their comments and voted keep after considering those arguments. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 15:57, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I encourage you to strike that remark, and have responded (and will continue to respond) on yourmy talk page. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 16:24, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Stop the "canvassing" talk. When people try to identify specific arguments for the purposes of such a review by referring to usernames using the customary 'ping'/'u' templates, this is not good evidence of canvassing. This is simply ordinary behavior. This is how people are used to type. Actus reus vs mens rea. Canvassing requires the latter. Don't accuse without evidence of the latter. It degrades this venue which is supposed to be highly authoritative and even if there was some puny attempt at canvassing it wouldn't affect the outcome. — Alalch Emis (talk) 18:37, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn. The stated reason for deletion by the closing admin was that the article "failed WP:NOR". Well, this is clearly not the case simply because the direct connection between the specific Nobel Prize winners and educational institutions they attended were made in many dozens RS cited on the page, not by Wikipedians. According to AfD requester, this is an "example of a trivial cross-categorisation of two entirely unrelated characteristics". Of course one could argue if the education plays a role in receiving the Nobel Prize (I am sure it does), but merely a fact that a specific cross-categorisation appears in a large number of RS (and they assume this is something significant) makes it worthy a list. My very best wishes (talk) 17:17, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In the discussion above, some participants say this is a case of WP:NOT. Of course one could argue about that (a WP:SOAP? An indiscriminate collection? - hardly), but it was not the reason for deletion by the closing admin, hence irrelevant. My very best wishes (talk) 17:37, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"the direct connection between the specific Nobel Prize winners and educational institutions they attended were made in many dozens RS cited on the page" - actually, that's quite the issue. Look up the Barack Obama example I gave earlier. The source used to support Obama's affiliation with 3 different universities does not even mention the word "Nobel" once... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 21:21, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, almost all RS make such connection. The official biography of every Nobel Prize winner by the Nobel Committee and other RS [7]always describe her or his Alma mater. Sure, if someone was a graduate from three Universities, then all of them appear in his biography. Does not mean "causation"? This is disputable, but irrelevant in WP context as long as multiple RS make such connection.My very best wishes (talk) 16:31, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Always"? No. Obama has no mention, because clearly, it is not a relevant aspect here. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:02, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If no such connection was made in RS with regard to person X, then such person should not be included to the list. This is very simple and apply to all lists. No judgement specificlly about Obama, but Nobel Peace Prize may be different because it is given not for scientific or art achievements. My very best wishes (talk) 18:49, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn 5 participants and the nominator argued for deletion - 15 argued for keeping. So is illogical that Sandstein would cast a Supervote again. The majority of participants do not agree with Sandstein's opinion about OR. Lightburst (talk) 21:01, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for illustrating the kind of utterly worthless comment (with NPA violation to boot) that any good closer will discard out of hand. --JBL (talk) 21:10, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I must admit that the last two comments are really doing their best /better than I could I was to try my best/ to make the overturn case look fabulously irrelevant :) — Alalch Emis (talk) 21:14, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There appears to be a lot of frustration, inter alia, being expressed from *all* many participants, irrespective of view. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 21:17, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Appallingly condescending and egregiously offensive comment by JBLUrselius (talk) 10:24, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It is. I think the issue is real--he has a lot of closes against numeric consensus, almost always to delete, and frankly I find many of them way out of bounds. Obviously not everyone does. But the right place for raising the issue probably isn't here. And it can certainly be phrased much more politely than Lightburst did (or than JBL did frankly). Hobit (talk) 14:58, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
weak Endorse. The answer is to make a more comprehensive form of List of Nobel laureates#List of laureates and to make it sortable by university affiliation among the many other things. The answer is not to fork to many separate list articles. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:59, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You're arguing the AfD question rather than the close, but to quickly respond, that's not really practical (that FL doesn't have room), and even if it was, many of the top universities have dozens of laureates, and sorting wouldn't be sufficient to convey the counts for them at a glance. {{u|Sdkb}}talk 01:57, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
A single comprehensive list can be spun out, not many forks for every sort query.
I appreciate that Nobel prize winners and their affiliation is a notable cross-section, eg [8] and appreciate the frustration for proponents of making this information accessible on Wikipedia. I also appreciate that there are a lot of List of Nobel laureates affiliated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology style lists, and that content forking is a concern. Although I note this was not a concern of the AfD nominator. So it’s difficult, but I think the closer made a good difficult close.
I really think that another approach is needed. A comprehensive table, sortable? A parent article for Nobel prizes by institution? SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:11, 23 October 2021 (UTC). I guess it’s a weak endorse. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:14, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn Sorry for being late to the scene. I see plenty of good arguments that demonstrate why the AfD decision was wrong, but it seems a simple vote in favor of an argument doesn't count for much here. For me, the charge of WP:OR, which the AfD closer supported, was consistently shown to be an extreme interpretation during the discussion -- one that would put all of WP on trial. As others have pointed out here, there were ample sources backing each item on the list. Perhaps one or two sources did not pass WP:V (?) or the numbers on the page were wrong (?) -- but rather than do the hard work to WP:FIXTHEPROBLEM, they decided to take the easy route and WP:TNT. The closer should have recognized that. I feel they took the easy route, too, and didn't read the keep arguments.As an aside, in most (?) western systems of law, the burden of proof lies with the prosecuting attorney, not the defendant. The prosecution must make their case and convince either a judge and/or jury to convict. If, as the closer appears to agree, there was no strong consensus to delete in this AfD, then there was no warrant for deletion. WP:AFD/AI states if there is a lack of consensus, the article should at least be relisted or kept (depending how many times it's been listed)-- not deleted outright. -Tiredmeliorist (talk) 14:58, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In many ways I think this is the best-phrased argument at this DRV. Well said. Hobit (talk) 15:01, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"one or two sources did not pass WP:V"; "the numbers on the page were wrong" - actually, most of them, because they were based on OR. You don't expect people to go fact check every single entry on the page, do you? In any case, I've already given a convincing example with Obama, who is one amongst many such problematic entries. "FIXTHEPROBLEM" - if the whole page wasn't OR, that would be a valid reason, but it is not, and this was not really mentioned by the AfD participants anyway; while TNT, if obliquely, was. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:02, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The phrase "original research" is used on this website to refer to material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published sources exist. On List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation, at least one reliable source was there for every entry. User:RandomCanadian, you completely missed something: The only "criteria" used on that list was the universally accepted definitions of "academic affiliation". Academic affiliation with a university is a universally defined term in academia: students, long-term academic staff, and short-term academic staff or visitors. The definition is elementary. It is like an axiom. RandomCanadian is basically having the same confusion that TompaDompa has. On Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation, there is a long discussion between TompaDompa, and Minimumbias and me. Please study that discussion carefully. User:RandomCanadian should read this comment by User:My very best wishes. Ber31 (talk) 17:46, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If it is universally accepted, why don't the numbers match the sources? Clearly, because it is not universally accepted... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:55, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Your argument still rests on this supposedly being "universally accepted". If this is "universally accepted", it should be trivial for you to find reliable sources which explicitly define the criteria, and which list Nobel prize recipients according to it. Given that no such source has been provided, that what sources have been provided list recipients according to different criteria, given that this leads to often entirely different totals, given that the talk page of the article and the text of the article itself (including the meta-reasoning about which criteria are used and the "fig-leaf" [to quote from somebody else] about how this supposedly does not breach NPOV and NOR) are obvious enough signs of the original research (literally: looking into questionable primary sources like self-published CVs...); it is clear that these criteria are not "universally accepted", and because this is the cornerstone on which your whole argument rests, I'm left with little more to do than simply sign the death certificate here. Feel free to disagree (if you can bring good evidence, such as the "significant new information" that is usually required to overturn an AfD); but don't ping me here again, as I'm tired of going around in circles and having the kind of argument that should be had at AfD, not at DRV. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 20:19, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Right, I agree we've descended back into the AfD discussion rather than whether the admin's decision to delete should be overturned. As my initial comment stated, there was WP:NOCONSENSUS and thus, "a lack of consensus normally results in the article, page, image, or other content being kept." The length of discussion here is also testament to the lack of consensus.-Tiredmeliorist (talk) 22:00, 23 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The question of where the burden of proof lies is an interesting and slightly complicated one. On the one hand, Tiredmeliorist is correct in their observation that a "no consensus" close is functionally identical to a "keep" close, and that's by design. On the other hand, it is codified in our content policies that the "burden of proof" (so to speak) is on those who think content should be included, see e.g. WP:BURDEN which says All content must be verifiable. The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and it is satisfied by providing an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports the contribution. (emphasis in original) and WP:ONUS which says While information must be verifiable to be included in an article, not all verifiable information needs to be included. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article. Such information should be omitted or presented instead in a different article. The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content. So the standards are not the same for articles and the content found within them. However, the issue at this deletion review is not what should be done when there is no consensus but rather whether the closer interpreted the consensus or lack thereof correctly.I think the only reasonable interpretation of our WP:Deletion policy is that where the burden of proof lies in deletion discussions depends on the WP:Reason for deletion. For WP:DELREASON#2 (Copyright violations and other material violating Wikipedia's non-free content criteria) the burden of proof must necessarily be on those arguing for deletion, because proving that something wasn't copied from elsewhere is impossible whereas proving that it was is straightforwardly done by showing where it was copied from. For similar reasons, when the discussion revolves around WP:DELREASON#6 (Articles that cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources, including neologisms, original theories and conclusions, and hoaxes), the burden of proof must necessarily be on those arguing for keeping—it is impossible to prove that something cannot be attributed to WP:Reliable sources, whereas proving that it can is accomplished simply by providing those sources.Viewed from that perspective, I think this was closed correctly. But then I would, seeing as I wasn't convinced by the arguments that this is WP:NOR-compliant. TompaDompa (talk) 00:00, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn I totally agree that it is now WP:NOR-compliant. Liusine (talk) 13:34, 24 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You're supposed to comment on the arguments and the close, not on the article. Avilich (talk) 13:59, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. There's not much point in having WP:NOTAVOTE and consensus-through-the-lens-of-policy if we're just going to toss it aside when a result comes along that we don't like. The closer explained how they had viewed the !votes cast and that the OR points had not been successfully countered by those wishing to keep. Note too that this was explicitly not a salting deletion, but simply a TNT of the original noncompliant page with an open invitation to any editor to recreate a similar list which did not suffer from the same OR issues. — Amakuru (talk) 00:10, 25 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That completely misconstrues the overturn arguments; it's precisely the contradiction between the closer asserting NOTAVOTE, but then relying on a vote count to determine an outcome that has been raised by numerous contributors (myself included). It's entirely possible to see this as a failed closure without any reference to the fact that many of the keep contributors did not discount the OR argument, rather, they did not feel it needed *explicit* engagement because there was already so much discussion on that issue to indicate this was obviously a content dispute. On the basis of the closer's own statements, there remains no explanation how evidence was weighed to draw the conclusion that the article was irredeemable....other than by a (reconfigured) count. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 09:25, 25 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
And that is the core of the problem. AFAICT, the closer just discounted all the !votes that didn't include a WP:NOR link or mention. Given that the issue itself was well addressed and the closer hasn't indicated exactly what NOR wasn't countered in the discussion, we have a huge problem. Hobit (talk) 13:56, 25 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Why allow any editors to weigh in on an AfD? We claim to be consensus based - but this AfD result exists to demonstrate that we are not. In Amukuru's example an admin should just go to each AfD and choose to apply one of the myriad of guidelines, policies and essays based on their own interpretation. I did not have hope for an overturn here because in my experience Admins are loathe to question each other, and a no-consensus is basically any ivote that is not snow. Lightburst (talk) 20:28, 25 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Right, i mean, WP:NOTAVOTE is there so to ensure "polling is not a substitute for discussion" -- was there not enough discussion on the AfD page (and here now)??? lol, there was WP:NOCONSENSUS. Oh yeah, and the majority did happen to vote Keep, as well, but for some reason it was still deleted. That is indeed a WP:SUPERVOTE. (But I mean that respectfully -- we all make bad calls and this just happens to be one). -Tiredmeliorist (talk) 00:01, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Once a competent closer disregards votes which are far off in left field (like the last ten keeps, arguing that this is notable without addressing any of the reasons for deletion), this isn't so much a "no consensus" as you claim. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 02:47, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, so if you disregard the opposition (or narrowly define who is "legitmate" opposition), then you have concensus? Cool. -Tiredmeliorist (talk) 00:03, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. This AfD and its closure is a poster child for WP:NOTAVOTE. There was a bunch of "keep" arguments, but very few addressed the core flaw of the list: WP:SYNTH. And I do not see it proparly addressed in this DRV either (except by hand-waving). The entire structure of the list lied on an original set of criteria (and even if we grant that the "affiliation" criterion was not "original", strictly speaking, it has never been applied to Nobel laureates in this form). Thus, it was correctly assessed unsalvageable as a whole, and the closer correctly weighed the votes and thoroughly explained their reasoning. There was some useful content that could be reused to build a compliant list some time in the future, but, as someone said, "it would be an entirely different list", and until it is built somewhere in the draftspace, we're better off without this one. No such user (talk) 07:21, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The problem of WP:SYNTH can be solved by removing the ranking table and putting the schools in the alphabetical order. Ber31 (talk) 13:28, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
And not having blatant editorialising about what constitutes academic affiliation and what is not. But that would require rewriting the artice... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 15:13, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
So... that would be a problem tht could be overcome by regular editing, then? Jclemens (talk) 18:09, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, the argument is that we would need to remove everything on the page and replace it with entirely new content, keeping none of the original content. "The construction of the article is so fundamentally flawed that we need to do it all over from scratch, turning it not into a different version of the current article but an entirely different article altogether" and "this can be overcome by regular editing" are fairly dissimilar positions. The closing comment even explicitly said that it can be recreated if this can be done in a non-OR manner.TompaDompa (talk) 18:42, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, the immediately prior suggestion is that removing the ranking table, placing things in alphabetical order, and removing editorializing abiout what constitutes academic affiliation would be sufficient. Arguments that the entire article needed a fundamental rewrite are undermined by the original nominator agreeing that far less than a rewrite would have been sufficient. Jclemens (talk) 22:29, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Well then I'm being misinterpreted, once more. As I have said multiple times, the article is so fundamentally flawed that it would need to be rewritten from the ground-up to address the issues (because the existing criteria for academic affiliation are based on blatant editorialising and not on sources, and the whole of the content of the article is based upon said criteria)... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 23:28, 26 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Closes are always based on quality of arguments, not on votes. Unfortunately, too many votes at AfD are based on poor quality arguments, and so therefore a raw vote count, even if strongly skewed, should never be an argument to overturn. Hemiauchenia (talk) 01:10, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn. The topic is clearly notable, and the Nobel association itself has a list, so NLIST is satisfied. The disagreement seems to me to turn on what qualifies as "affiliation". That is a matter for cleanup, not deletion. Clarityfiend (talk) 01:59, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
A true work of art. --JBL (talk) 12:26, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn per SDKB and several others. Sandstein again! Tsk, tsk. Johnbod (talk) 02:00, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn I think the closer applied thier own opinion over the consensus. You cant just unilaterally decide what is right or not on Wikipedia, it takes collaboration. I do think the OR can simply be fixed rather than deleting the whole article. Cleanup rather than delete. Wikiman5676 (talk) 02:43, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I also think the arguemnt that the article is mostly Synthesis is not that great. Synthesis is about putting sources together as a form of analysis or to reach non-explicitly stated conclusions. I dont think that article was making a conclusion about much, just stating information. Wikiman5676 (talk) 02:47, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'd also like to point out that the only WP:DELETE criteria for deleting a page on WP:SYNTHESIS is if the page "cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources". But this isnt that case. The closer even said that the page could be made again without Synthesis. So just fix the page where it does violate Synthesis rather than delete the whole thing. Wikiman5676 (talk) 03:22, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
WP:DEL#REASON no. 6 (notwithstanding a literal reading which misses the spirit of the thing) was certainly a valid reason... (especially if the whole of the article is based on an OR methodology) RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 04:06, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I still dont think that was the spirit either. the reason it was written that way was so that pages with synthesis can simply be improved rather than deleted. and again, as pointed out in my prior comments, i really dont think the whole page was OR. Maybe some of it was, but that should simply be fixed. Wikiman5676 (talk) 04:23, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If the criteria the list is based on are WP:OR (and the argument was that they were), that would make the entire list WP:OR, no? I think the WP:SYNTH referred to is the modus operandi on the page of citing a person's curriculum vitae (or similar) and combining that with citing them as a Nobel laureate, then applying the aforementioned WP:OR criteria for what counts as "affiliation" to reach the non-explicitly stated conclusion "person X is a Nobel laureate affiliated with university Y" by way of analysis. TompaDompa (talk) 06:10, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
First of all, deleting an article because it "...cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources..." when every single fact is sourced seems, at best, strange. Secondly, that view didn't have consensus in the AfD. Heck the closer can't even state how WP:OR was violated and thus caused the article to need to be deleted. I fully understand the view you are expressing. And not only do I disagree with it, I don't see how anyone can read the discussion and find that view has consensus. Most of the people !voting to endorse here are ignoring the discussion and liking the result... Hobit (talk) 10:05, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
deleting an article because it "...cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources..." when every single fact is sourced seems, at best, strange Perhaps an example would help illustrate that there isn't necessarily anything strange about it and why? Last year, we deleted no fewer than 40 (12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940) "Line of succession to the former throne of X" articles. One could perhaps say that every single fact was sourced there if the succession law was sourced and the genealogy was too, but the lines of succession themselves were still impossible to attribute to reliable sources because they were the result of Wikipedia editors applying the criteria (succession law) to the facts (the genealogy) improperly. To my eye, that's not entirely dissimilar to what happened here. TompaDompa (talk) 11:50, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Fair argument, I like it. I don't agree with it, but it does make sense. Here however we have a single criteria to cover the whole thing. One decision that *is* backed by reliable sources (though other reliable sources make other decisions). We often have to deal with different sources using different definitions of terms and our job is to find the most commonly accepted and go from there. This is true in engineering articles (what do we call a master/slave flip-flip for example, the terminology is changing rapidly) and we don't *not* discuss it just because we don't have a clear answer to the question. If those contributing to the AfD had found consensus on the issue then I'd likely endorse the outcome. But I don't see any reasonable reading of that AfD that can conclude consensus was reached that accepts deletion was needed for that reason. Quite the opposite actually, as I read it, consensus was that this wasn't reason to delete the article. The idea was widely rejected by those attending the AfD. Hobit (talk) 12:17, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"What should we call a thing that everyone agrees exists and is well defined" is a very different kind of problem from the problem here. --JBL (talk) 12:26, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
My reading was somewhat different. My reading of the discussion about the criteria is that it was basically:"These criteria are WP:OR and that propagates to the rest of the content making the entire article WP:OR." "They're not WP:OR, this is the universally accepted definition of affiliation." "You're going to have to back that up with sources." "No I don't, it's common sense."I found the argument that it isn't WP:OR rather unconvincing, but then I would since I was making the opposite argument. Nowhere did I see anyone actually backing up the rather elaborate criteria with sources. TompaDompa (talk) 13:24, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
A number of sources were cited. [9] was one that uses the same definition we do. I suppose we could separate this information into different lists (where they were educated, where they were when they won, all places they worked). Those all have plenty of sources, yes? But I don't think breaking it out like that would serve our readers, do you? Hobit (talk) 14:55, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The assertion that that source uses the same definition we do was made during the AfD, and I remain unconvinced. If it does, it's lying or mistaken when it says that Affiliates of University of Cambridge have received more Nobel Prizes than those of any other institution. since our list attributed 44 more to Harvard than to Cambridge. Our set of criteria did not come from the sources, but from the editors themselves (see below).I think what would serve our readers best would be not having a list that is constructed by editors hunting down laureates' CVs and applying a set of criteria that they came up with through talk page discussion about how it should be done (as a couple of editors arguing in favour of keeping the list repeatedly pointed out was the way this set of criteria were arrived at, though their framing was largely that the the criteria reflected editor consensus, seen for instance here: It is the duty of every editor to respect Wikipedia:Consensus. In the end, the criteria for the list emerged out of many careful discussions between different editors over the years.) to decide whether someone should count as affiliated with a particular university or not. Whether that is accomplished by not having a list at all or by having a list that is properly based on the sources (e.g. the official Nobel Prize website's list) is a different question, and the close specifically allowed for the latter option to be taken. From that perspective, this deletion review mostly serves as a roadblock standing in the way of recreating this list in a WP:NOR-compliant way from e.g. the official Nobel Prize website's list. TompaDompa (talk) 15:39, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
TompaDompa: You are arguing as if the list is WP:OR unless it's entirely referenced on one source: Nobel Laureates and research affiliations at NobelPrize.org. That is your subjective interpretation, and that would violate WP:NPV! That source only shows the universities, research institutions or companies Nobel prize winners were affiliated with at the time of the Nobel Prize announcement, and it only shows prize winners in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, and Economics; it doesn't show the prize winners in Literature or Peace. That source doesn't show the alma maters of prize winners. List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation was much more comprehensive. Ber31 (talk) 14:41, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, that's not what I said (what do you think "e.g." means?). Your references to subjectivity and WP:NPV are baffling to me. Only counting affiliations at the time of the announcement is neither more nor less subjective than also including affiliations before and after the announcement. Excluding the Literature and Peace Prizes is neither more nor less subjective than including them. Excluding alma maters is neither more nor less subjective than excluding them. For that matter, including honorary degrees, posthumous degrees, summer attendees, exchange students and auditing students (which would have made the list more comprehensive, which you seem to think is important) would have been neither more nor less subjective than excluding them (which is what our list did). Those are all judgment calls that have to be made, and we as Wikipedia editors are not supposed to be making them, we're supposed to leave those judgment calls to reliable sources. For all your invocation of WP:Neutral point of view, you seem to have forgotten that it's the positions found in the sources that determines what's WP:NPOV-compliant, not what you or I or the majority of editors or even the general public thinks. TompaDompa (talk) 15:06, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I said List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation was much more comprehensive than the Nobel source. Ber31 (talk) 15:36, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
User:TompaDompa: In many cases, the positions found in the sources can be tricky. By the way, TD, we are having endless discussions... Can we find a common ground and work together? Ber31 (talk) 15:44, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Right, my point is that it would have been even more comprehensive if we had included additional types of affiliations. And that would not necessarily have been an improvement. So I don't think that "more comprehensive" is better. I think "more in line with how the sources do it" is better. Doing it the way the official Nobel Prize website does it would be more in line with the sources than the way it was done on our list.I'm sure we can find some kind of common ground and work together. Like I said in the AfD, I'm not opposed to having a list that looks at the intersection of Nobel laureates and universities. But we would need to strictly adhere to the sources in how the list is constructed and how the laureates are counted. TompaDompa (talk) 16:21, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn per SDKB. Uhooep (talk) 07:21, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn. I agree with the delete !voters that the page was a wall of synth, and it should probably be TNTed. But that wasn't the consensus. The keep !voters advanced a perfectly reasonable, policy-based response to the deletion argument. NLIST is a response to NOR, because if the cross-categorization is covered in reliable sources, the OR problems should theoretically be fixable. Keep !voters made this case, citing reliable sources (most notably [10]), and subsequent participants agreed. That's a consensus to keep. Danstronger (talk) 13:12, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
NLIST isn't a policy, and mere citing of sources does not prove that the issues outlined by the nomination have been surmounted, however 'theoretically' possible (a possibility not very evident from the discussion). Avilich (talk) 13:56, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Some of those keep votes, especially the flurry at the end, were worth very little ("A very well referenced and important list"; "List of basic facts"; "A notable list is a notable list"; "There's an absurdly long discussion above that I haven't read, but fundamentally this passes WP:LISTN"). A large number indeed did not address the supposed policy violations addressed in the nomination, and the closer made the correct choice when considering the policy-based arguments only and removing policy-noncompliant content from the mainspace. If notability is the problem, then a refund can be requested and the article worked on the draftspace until it becomes ready for mainspace again, as the closer explicitly allowed. Avilich (talk) 13:56, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn, the arguments by Andrew Davison and Clarityfiend that used sources to show the page does not violate WP:NOR convinced all of the subsequent voters, showing a clear consensus. People disagreeing with such a consensus should vote, not close. —Kusma (talk) 14:09, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
At best, that removes an ancillary concern, not the fundamental one. XOR'easter (talk) 19:41, 27 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. Many of the arguments in favor of keeping the page tried to argue that those calling for deletion did not "understand" the article. The editors had developed their own criteria for what constitutes a university affiliation: one that was so broad that the page claimed higher numbers for each university than the braggart universities themselves claimed. There was even a notation under each university on the Wikipedia article stating the number counted on the Wikipedia article and the (lower) number actually claimed by the university. They were contradicting the sources themselves, thereby falling under WP:SYNTH. Similarly, the Wikipedia article actually contradicted the affiliations that the Nobel Foundation itself has at https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/facts/lists/affiliations.php. They did not address those concerns, so the closer rightly determined that the page ought to be deleted. For the record, I voted delete in the original discussion. OCNative (talk) 00:21, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
An argument that boils down to "we have chosen to take an approach not adopted by the sources because we have decided that this is the approach we think the sources ought to have adopted" doesn't exactly help your case here. TompaDompa (talk) 15:06, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I have never said the sources ought to have adopted this approach or that approach. Ber31 (talk) 15:36, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, you're right. That was an unwarranted inference by me. It would be more accurate to say that your argument boils down to "we have chosen to take an approach not adopted by the sources because we have decided that this is the approach we think should be adopted even if the sources don't". TompaDompa (talk) 16:21, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse In essence, per David Eppstein and Mackensen. Ultimately, the proponents advanced a reasonable policy based argument, and most editors voting keep failed to engage with that argument at all. Most did not really even present much of an argument. I guess there is consensus that the idea of a "List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation" is notable, but there wasn't consensus that this particular iteration of that idea (or any similar iteration) is actually in compliance with policy. Indeed, the consensus seemed to be that it is not. It's a bolder close than I would've made, but maybe "!vote" should actually mean something. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 00:22, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia policy is arrived at largely by consensus, and such policies are sometimes wildly inappropriate for some cases; perhaps the interpretation and application of policies should be similarly consensus driven? Urselius (talk) 14:55, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, in 50/50 cases, IMO at least more than one admin should make the final decision. Ber31 (talk) 15:39, 28 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above is an archive of the deletion review of the page listed in the heading. Please do not modify it.