Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Empirical limits in science

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was redirect to Empiricism. The "keep" opinions don't address the problems identified in the nomination (OR/SYNTH). Sandstein 09:04, 14 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Empirical limits in science[edit]

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Contested redirect. Justification was made on the talkpage as follows:

I looked through this article and cannot see anything worth keeping. Our article on empiricism can use some expansion, I would wager, but this should be done over there and not here. To start, the article did not even define what was meant by a "limit" and, because of that, never really established what the scope of the article was supposed to be. There are physiological limits to the senses, there are epistemological limits to what knowledge can be gained empirically, and there are even political arguments as to what empirical evidence is good for in the context of persuading others or making claims about questions of moral or legal judgements. None of these points are adequately identified in the lede and then the rest of the article goes on to give a pretty half-assed description of how sensory perception works without really engaging in the literature that argues that our division into five senses is arbitrary and cultural, for example. Finally, the article went on about certain advances in science that are made through improved observations and then questions about language. Yuck. Wikipedia is WP:NOT a place to write original essays like this. It is a place to summarize the best available sources in context.

Some of the text might be usable on other articles, but as a standalone, this one just wasn't worth keeping. I think preserving the history is fine in case someone wants to use some of this material elsewhere.

Annoyed that WP:NOTBURO wasn't followed by Thriley (talk · contribs) who did not even bother to engage on the talkpage with their reasoning, but not that annoyed, I guess. jps (talk) 15:41, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Philosophy and Science. jps (talk) 15:41, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect to empiricism as nominator. History can be preserved. Future WP:CFORK is, in principle, possible though I think it unlikely. jps (talk) 15:44, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It's not clear to me what grounds you are using to nominate this for deletion. It has been in existence on Wikipedia since 12 June 2008‎; it was recently expanded; it is not in violation for lacking sourcing, plagiarism, vandalism, etc. Disliking the way in which it is written is generally a reason to improve an article, not to delete it. If you are arguing that the content should be merged, then a merge proposal seems the appropriate step to propose, not a deletion. Mary Mark Ockerbloom (talk) 03:19, 7 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- When the result is a redirect without keeping any of the content of the original article, normally AfD is what is required. While we can tag with a merge at the top of an article, AfD is also where merge decisions get made as well. You are free to !vote "merge" if that's the way you feel. jps (talk) 00:24, 8 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Mary Mark Ockerbloom (talk · contribs) that improvement or merging (if possible) would be a better direction to take. Also "Yuck" did not add anything constructive, just inappropriate in my opinion. Airstarfish (talk) 07:12, 7 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- Sorry. I dislike poor content and this article is a prime example of such. jps (talk) 00:24, 8 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Article is assigned to various WikiProjects and could be improved, or at the least, merged. Dorevabelfiore (talk) 16:18, 8 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- This is an unusual keep rationale. Assigning an article to a Wikiproject can be done by anyone for any reason -- I don't see why that should be a reason to keep an article. I am glad you agree with me that the article could be improved or merged, but why is that a "keep" then? What value is there in keeping the article in articlespace as opposed to redirecting to Empiricism? jps (talk) 18:09, 8 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. This article doesn't remotely meet any of the common deletion reasons. It's appropriately sourced and is on a notable topic. This is a subtopic of empiricism, but that article is fairly long and is mainly historical, and I don't think a merge would be appropriate. The nominator's comments would be appropriate for requesting improvements during a GA review, but the bar for basic inclusion is much lower than that. See also WP:ARTN and WP:NOTPERFECT. John P. Sadowski (NIOSH) (talk) 02:57, 10 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The article is bald WP:SYNTHesis at least. How do you not see that? jps (talk) 12:41, 13 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect - This article definitely reads as a product of early Wikipedia, where people were much more fast & loose with article content. There is not really a coherent topic here, and the article reflects that by meandering between different subjects without really giving any of them more than a brief overview. Specific articles on the various topics included here might be of use, but such a broad (and ill-defined) topic as covered by this article can't be anything more than what we have. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 15:45, 11 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep in mind WP:ARTN (part of WP:N)—for AfD you need to justify that no good article could ever be written about this topic. Any identified inadequacies in the current text are irrelevant for an AfD discussion. John P. Sadowski (NIOSH) (talk) 16:52, 11 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  - I don't think a good article can be written about this topic as there isn't a consistent framing in the literature. I remind you of WP:NOR. We are not a place to be publishing hot takes on what students think about the limits of science, which is what this article currently is and, it seems, is the only thing it really can ever be given the lack of consensus in reliable sources about what it means to have a "limit in such contexts. jps (talk) 12:21, 13 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to empiricism. I concur that we are not a platform for hot takes on what students think about the limits of science. Neither the version nominated for deletion nor the shortened version produced during the process actually defined the scope of what the article should cover; there's nothing well-defined enough to improve upon here. It's conceivable in principle that a worthwhile article could be written under this title, but trying to pass this off as that does a disservice to the reader. XOR'easter (talk) 22:21, 13 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.