Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2021 October 21

21 October 2021

List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation

List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)

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)

• 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)}
• Overturn per SDKB. NW1223(^{Howl at me}/_{My hunts}) 17:42, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
• 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)
• 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)
• 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)

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)

• 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)

  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)

  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)

  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)

  (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)

  Relists are intended to address insufficient participation. That was not an issue here. Sandstein 22:26, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

  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)

• (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)
• 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)
  • 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)
    • 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)
      • 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)
        • 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)
  • Very well said. Regarding your last sentence, I refactored my !vote on reflection. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 19:41, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
• 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)

• 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. Reyk _YO! 19:59, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

• 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. Dream Focus 20:08, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
  • 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)
    • 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)
• 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)

• 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)

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)

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)

• 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)
• 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)

  User:RandomCanadian: Your core argument was refuted by me in the AFD. Please carefully study: diff 1diff 2. Ber31 (talk) 10:58, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  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)

• 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)
  • 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)
    • 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)
      • 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)
        • 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)
          • 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)
            • 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! Reyk _YO! 23:18, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
              • 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)
                • 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)
                  • 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. Reyk _YO! 12:37, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
• 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)
• 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)
  • 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)
    • 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)
      • 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)
        • 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)
• Comment, could the article be temporarily restored while the review is ongoing please? Vpab15 (talk) 22:35, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
  • It would require steward intervention. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 22:41, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
    • It's accessible via the Wayback Machine here. TompaDompa (talk) 23:00, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
      • Thanks! I thought the article was supposed to be undeleted per Wikipedia:Deletion_review#Temporary_undeletion, but it seems that isn't always followed. Vpab15 (talk) 23:25, 21 October 2021 (UTC)
    • 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)
• 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)
• 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)
• 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)

  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)

  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)

  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)

  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)

  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)

• 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)

  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)

  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)

  This seems to be more of an argument for relist than overturn though? Vladimir.copic (talk) 01:33, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  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)

• 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)
• 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)
• 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)
• (Notice to the closing admin: I had already decided to retire, so I wasn't sure whether I should participate in this discussion or not! User:Minimumbias asked me to join this discussion.[2] I have decided to "vote". Since I am retired user, the closing admin should determine whether my "vote" will count or not. If the closing admin decided not to count my "vote", I will be OK with that decision.) OK, so my "vote" is 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.[3] 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.[4] User:Andrew Davidson explained why the list doesn't violate WP:NOR.[5] Routine calculations do not count as original research. User:Tiredmeliorist also explained why the list doesn't violate WP:SYNTHESIS or WP:NOR.[6] 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. Anyway, I would like to wish all the editors who joined the discussion all the best! Ber31 (talk) 04:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  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)

  User:Pppery: I am not pinging anyone. Please don't be cynical. By the way, User:Gah4 and User:Andrew Davidson already voted on this page before my "vote". Ber31 (talk) 05:33, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  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)

  I think there was also some canvassing here unfortunately. Vladimir.copic (talk) 04:29, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  WP:IQUIT is not a good stance to take. Vladimir.copic (talk) 04:45, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

  "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. Anyway, my retirement is irrelevant to this discussion. The above comment concerning my retirement is for the closing admin of this DRV. Ber31 (talk) 06:19, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

• 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)

  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)

• 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)

  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)

• 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)
  • 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)
• 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 Marshall T/C 09:01, 22 October 2021 (UTC)
• @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)
• Endorse Serves little purpose and as a block of information can be created faster and better offsite. scope_creep^Talk 12:59, 22 October 2021 (UTC)