Oskar Sigvardsson wrote:
On 3/17/07, Philip Sandifer
<snowspinner(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Which is, we should note, appalling. The idea that
interesting
articles that nobody seriously doubts the accuracy of and are in no
way inflammatory or going to cause anyone any problems to anybody
should be deleted is ridiculous.
While I do agree with you on this article, your general point I find
very questionable. When did it become such a ridiculous idea that
subjects of articles in an *encyclopedia* should meet some criterion
of notability? That is the way encyclopedias always have been.
We have no need to be strict about notability. Having stray articles
that escape some subjective criterion for notability does no great
harm. If these stubby articles are so lacking in notability it is
unlikely that anyone will look at them anyways.
There are of course very pragmatic reasons for
requiring notability
(maintainability, privacy and original research, amongst others), but
there are very convincing philosophical arguments that convinces me
that it is a Good Thing. We are an encyclopedia first, everything else
second. With every decision we make, that should be our number 1
consideration. If we let non-encyclopedic topics in we will be a worse
encyclopedia, and therefore we shouldn't do it. How is that not all
that matters?
None of your so-called pragmatic reasons is strong enough alone to
support support deletion. If the articles are so short there is nothing
to maintain, and the other two "reasons" can be invoked in their own
right without having recourse to notability.
Your conclusion is not logically sound. The fact that A implies B does
not support the conclusion that not-A implies not-B. Having
"non-encyclopedic topics" (whatever that means) does not make us a worse
encyclopaedia.
Ec