Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Øyvind Eikrem

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 of the debate was Delete - CrazyRougeian talk/email 00:49, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Øyvind Eikrem

This person has a Norwegian PhD in social anthropology, but no citations in the literature, and otherwise no noteworthy contributions towards being listed in Wikipedia. The entry on his thesis supervisor Stein Erik Johansen has also been nominated for deletion (not by me), but he likewise has no citations and little notability. If Stein Erik Johansen is not notable, then this person certainly isn't. Both entries are simple translations from the Norwegian wikipedia by Øyvind Eikrem himself (see no:Øyvind Eikrem and no:Stein Erik Johansen) and Øyvind Eikrem's entry has been proposed for deletion at the Norwegian wikipedia. Janbrogger 14:59, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

• Delete WP:VANITY ~ trialsanderrors 16:08, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Delete per WP:BIO. Thanks for the detailed nomination of someone working in a field and language that many Wikipedians will find hard to assess for notability.
  (For future reference, you should probably remove {{prod}} templates when AfDing an article; it makes the prod redundant.) — Haeleth Talk 17:08, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Delete nn bio. Alias Flood 17:28, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. The real test here is WP:PROFTEST. And regardless of who did what when and why (below), I can't really verifiably see how this person meets that. Grandmasterka 03:43, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion on bias

Some caution seems prudent about possible bias on the part of Janbrogger and his relation to Øyvind Eikrem. Brogger is the son of Jan Brøgger – a Norwegian professor of social anthropology and a clinical psychologist who died in February of this year. Eikrem is also a Norwegian philosopher, clinical psychologist, and social anthropologist. Eikrem has edited the article on the Norwegian Wikipedia about Janbrogger's father (they both have the name "Jan Brøgger") and the corresponding article on English Wikipedia was created by Eikrem.

It should be noted that Eikrem only has two out of a total 24 edits on the Norwegian no:Jan Brøgger article. More importantly, the content of Eikrem's edits introduced undocumented information about Jan Brøgger (sr.) being a controversial figure in Norwegian public discourse. I will take the liberty of translating the paragraph that must have appeared contentious to Jan Brøgger jr. as he proceeded to delete it in consecutive edit citing violation of Wikipedia:Verifiability (the English WP policy guideline as Norwegian WP doesn't currently have this) and WP:NPOV (Norwegian version):

Apart from his work as professor, Jan C. Brøgger was well-known in public discourse. He often took side asserting unpopular views, and his entire life he polemicized strongly in favor of his views on the role of the family as the supporting institution in society and against authoritarian movements (particularly on the left side of poltics).

It is curious that Jan Christian Brøgger jr. being a physician should happen to step forward to assert a lack of notability warranting the removal from Wikipedia an article about a humanities scholar who just happened to hold the same credentials as his father and who had inserted information about his father in a (Norwegian) Wikipedia article that Brøgger jr. took offense to. __meco 10:08, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Response

First, to put it all in perspective, please not that the entry for Stein Erik Johansen, the PhD thesis advisor for Øyvind Eikrem, was nominated independently for removal by a Wikipedia editor who has >5000 edits with an interest in the same fields. After this, I nominated Øyvind Eikrem for deletion. If his thesis advisor is not notable, clearly his never-cited student is not notable.

Now, to bias. The edit given above is completely incorrect. The paragraph above has been retained. The paragraph that I edited out was a different one, and was removed because it was POV and unsourced. Later my edit was commended by a Norwegian social anthropologist and other respondents (see the Norwegian discussion page). In the discussion page, I stated that while the viewpoints were interesting and might have some relation to actual fact, Wikipedia is not the place to start a discussion over the contributions of a deceased researcher, without sources (official Wikipedia policy WP:OR). With sources, it would be a different matter. As a matter of fact, I have found and entered sources for other controversial statements in this biography. I don't object to negative attention, it is just that unsupported personal opinion should not be prominent in a biography (or really any kind of unsourced slant in any direction). The actual paragraph removed was (my translation):

"Brøggers position in Norwegian anthropology was disputed. On the one hand he was given a lot of attention in public, but on the other hand he was not well regarded - at least not within the scholarly community nationally."

I happen to know Øyvind Eikrem because we went to the same school, and thus took an interest. I would not have noticed his entry if he hadn't edited Jan Brøgger's entry on the Norwegian Wikipedia, but that is the way of things. I've proceeded to take up to discussion on the Norwegian Wikipedia signpost the criteria for lexical notability, and a majority of respondents thought that simply a PhD and a clinical degree isn't sufficiently notable - especially without any citations or media attention. Some on the Norwegian Wikipedia hold that being elected to county office or getting a PhD is sufficient for notability, which means >500 new Norwegian PhD entries and 2000 county office entries per year - nearly impossible, but they are a minority. It should be noted that all respondents favored deleting the Norwegian Wikipedia entry on Øyvind Eikrem. If it is deleted there because of no notability, clearly it does not belong here. This nomination for deletion is clearly consistent with the Wikipedia person notability criteria (cant link directly to Notability:People.

I've contributed to some Norwegian and English Wikipedia pages over the last year (within my scientific field or personal interests). The debate between inclusions and deletionists has not yet been concluded. But it is my policy that all articles I contribute to should be properly sourced, and this will be borne out by my contributions. Also note that I do not consider myself notable enough for a Norwegian or English Wikipedia entry, even though I have >10 papers in the international literature and have been cited >60 times internationally, including in the The British Medical Journal and editorial comment in the Quarterly Journal of Medicine, Thorax, European Respiratory Journal, and International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease. If this entry is retained, perhaps I should reconsider.

I thus stand by my nomination for deletion, and hold that it is unbiased and criterion-based, not based on personal animosity. However, I've come to appreciate the debate between inclusionists and deletionists. WP is not paper, and if there is some support for retaining this entry, by all means do. However, I predict that it is only going to be edited by the author or his friends (probably anonymous edits). Time will show. -- Janbrogger 21:05, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I rest somewhat assured. I did translate the wrong paragraph, which I'm glad to see has been rectified. However, I would have been even more happy to have seen Janbrogger present a full disclosure at the time of nominating for deletion that this could raise questions regarding his neutral point of view. __meco 00:03, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

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.