Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maximum empower

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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 no consensus to delete. Johnleemk | Talk 11:32, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Maximum empower

This afd nomination was incomplete. The nominator's reasoning was that it is original research. Listing now. —Crypticbot (operator) 15:50, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

This is one of a number of related deletion debates, you may wish to study all of them before forming a judgment. - Just zis  Guy, you know? [T]/[C] (W) AfD? 21:18, 1 December 2005 (UTC)


  • Comment. Googling for empower eMergy (with an m) shows that various academics are talking about it, so its not quite OR. However, when one starts reading about it, its has this wacky flavour to it ... fringe science verging on pseudoscience. Its hard for me to beleive that economists don't already have better names and theories for these concepts. It doesn't help that this and the related WP articles are all a bit off-kilter... linas 23:16, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
Comment How right you are, Linas. But they aren't trying to come off that way to users like you or me, they just don't know any better. There are actually many challenging conceptual issues in ecology which have not been adequately addressed by talented applied mathematicians, only by mathematically challenged ecologists. This has been very harmful to that field. I should also add that not all ecologists have been mathematically challenged by any means, in fact you'd probably get a kick out of some classic papers by Robert May once you have enough dynamical systems and ecology background. ---CH 03:45, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete. The article fails to define what Maximum empower is, or even what empower is, spending only three very short sentances on its definition. It then takes a decent paragraph to point out that there have been no scientific articles published on it, and that the physics and chemistry community reject the concept. As such, it seems to be both non-notable and original research by the article author into some uncertain concept originally advanced by H.T. Odum. linas 02:38, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep - this is a central part of H.T. Odum's work; well established, solid science. Guettarda 03:24, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
    Perhaps you should edit the article so that it explains the "principle" it refers to. Gazpacho 03:49, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. Empower has been referred to in Odum's Environmental Accounting, and A Prosperous way down. The principle of maximum empower is notable because Odum identifies it as what policy should aim towards. The concept has historical and contemporary use, and should therefore be included in Wiki. Currently I try to fill Odum shoes for the world but cannot and need help. In the aim of having Odum's concepts freely available, the afd nominator should help find a good definition and append it to the article. Sholto Maud 03:28, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. Although this article has many features of a typical crank science article, it is in fact published research by a respected professor. Gazpacho 03:31, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
Can you fix the article so that it actually says something, instead of floundering? We are not trying to delete a respected professor's research, we are trying to delete a nonsense article about that professors research. linas 20:35, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
Comment: Do we really need quite so many articles to ocver this topic? Perhaps Sholto could enlist some help in merging the various articles into one or two really good ones? - Just zis  Guy, you know? [T]/[C] (W) AfD? 21:20, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment Fair point. My original idea was separate entries, rather like the entries on the laws of thermodynamics, each detailing the math behind the concepts when time permitted me and others to contribute such. Each concept might rolled into one entry on the emergy nomenclature, with a separate entry under H.T.Odum and his work?? Maybe that would be a better way to structure things. Sholto Maud
Comment Anyone interesting in helping me merge some of these controversial articles into two (or three) really good ones that are free from my own personal bias and original research? I seem to find it hard to know where the line between orginal research and original clarity of presentation lies. :) Sholto Maud 07:41, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
Comment Linas, if you saw my comment in the other AfD with some suggestions for how you could study up to act as an ambassador from math/physics to ecology, it sounds like Sholto would be happy to work with you on this. I actuall y think this would be quite valuable to ecologists, but it might not get you many points in physics grad school, sigh...---CH 03:41, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. I agree that all these pages are really poorly written, but that is no reason to have them deleted. The status of these conepts is just above OR (they are used in well cited articles in scientific journals), so the pages should stay and be improved. We cannot expect to have a nice chunk of text on a subject so obscure from the beggining. Karol 16:15, 4 December 2005 (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.
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