Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bert Vaux

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 keep. John254 00:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bert Vaux

Bert Vaux (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

No indication of meeting the academics' notability guidelines at WP:PROF. Had been tagged as possibly insufficiently notable since July; that tag and a PROD were removed by an anon without comment or improvement to the article. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 08:27, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

• He formulated Vaux's Law - I added corresponding info with references. He qualifies per criteria no. 5: "The person is known for originating an important new concept, theory or idea which is the subject of multiple, independent, non-trivial reviews or studies in works meeting our standards for reliable sources." --tickle me 02:04, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• Keep. Google search result is very good. [1] An expert of his field. 76.17.125.144 (talk) 02:13, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
  • His field has hundreds of experts. What makes him stand out? Thank you, tickle me, for adding info on Vaux's Law, although as someone with a Ph.D. in phonological theory, I'm still not convinced of its earth-shattering importance. The idea that voiceless fricatives are [+spread glottis] has been around a lot longer than 1998; it's not as if no one had ever thought of it before him. Thus I feel he still fails criterion no. 5 since "Vaux's Law" is neither important nor new. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 08:38, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:51, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
• Keep what makes him stand out? First, the naming of a scientific law after him. Second, position as a professor at a major university, and an equivalent position at another. third, publishing several books on the subject by the highest quality university presses. There are probably a few thousand people with doctorates in linguistics, and the top 10% or 20% or so stand out. DGG (talk) 18:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Please don't be blindsided by the fact that we linguists like to use the word "law" to refer to broad generalizations that (unlike laws in physics, for example) usually have almost as many exceptions as examples. Perhaps the top 10% or 20% of the people with doctorates in linguistics stand out, but your criteria (position as a professor at a major university, publishing several books with high-quality university presses) cover more like the top 50% to 60% of them.—Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 19:21, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

*Keep. As per DGG. In addition, he has a reasonable citation record on Google Scholar[2], given the size of the field, these citation numbers are probably pretty good. The title of the journal mentioned in the opening paragraph sounds wrong, though, perhaps someone can find the correct one? --Crusio (talk) 18:26, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• • When you enclose his name in quotes, his Google Scholar hits sink to 200. For comparison, my own name gets about the same number (and as far as I can tell, the majority do all refer to me, not to possible other people with the same name). Sorry, but even when restricted to Google Scholar, Google hits ≠ notability. To your second point, that seems to be the right name. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 19:21, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• Perhaps there should then be an article about you, too :-). Seriously, I don't know the field of linguistics well. In my own field (Neuroscience and Genetics) these citation counts would be rather modest, but I gathered that articles having more than 40 citations might be rather good in linguistuics. Is that mistaken? --Crusio (talk) 10:15, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

• You mean an article that's been cited in 40 other articles (written by other people, of course!)? Yes, that's pretty good (my dissertation only gets 26), but it doesn't seem to be significantly more than would be expected of anyone hoping to get tenure. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 11:25, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  My thesis got 2 or 3 (all by myself... :-) How about the other points mentioned by DGG (books with major publishers, "law" named after him)? --Crusio (talk) 11:43, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  He has one book with OUP, presumably an updated version of his dissertation. He also has one book with Lincom Europa, which is a pretty minor publisher that will (if the rumors I've heard are true) publish almost anything and then refuse to pay authors their royalties. And he's the editor of an upcoming volume of papers. Nothing out of the ordinary for someone with tenure or hoping to get it soon. As for "Vaux's Law", I was made aware of the connection between voiceless fricatives and aspirated stops when I was in grad school, well before he published that paper. I really don't understand why it gets to be named after him. He's a fine phonologist and still relatively young; maybe he'll do something in the future that will really change the course of phonological theory, but to me, it doesn't look like he has so far. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 13:07, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  So you would not agree with DGG that Vaux is in the top 10-20% of his field now (we cannot predict what may or may not happen in future)? --Crusio (talk) 17:09, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  No, I don't. The top 10-20% of his field is occupied by the likes of Morris Halle [3], Paul Kiparsky [4], John Goldsmith [5], John McCarthy [6], Alan Prince [7], Nick Clements [8] (whom we don't even have an article on), and Bruce Hayes [9]. Check their Google Scholar cite hits to see what the top of the field looks like. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 17:25, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  You've convinced me: Delete. --Crusio (talk) 11:08, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

just going by numbers, f there are say 500 experts, then the top 20% is 100 and we should have articles on them all, not just the 5 or 6. But the WP:PROF criterion is more notable than the average, so he just has to be in the top 50% to meet that. DGG (talk) 21:17, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

If you interpret WP:PROF to mean the top 50% of academics in any field are notable enough to be covered, then WP:PROF is not nearly restrictive enough. If we were really to list everyone living and dead who has ever published a phonology book or paper in order of how often their work gets cited by other people, I genuinely doubt he would be in the top 20% of that list. The list I gave about is not intended to be exhaustive; it just represents how many Google Scholar cite hits one can expect from top phonologists. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 21:30, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

• Keep I added a section that shows he's quoted in mainstream press. Also see google news search.[10] AliveFreeHappy (talk) 11:40, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I just added still more refs from the mainstream press, and there are still more of them. Plus I added a couple more books we authored or co-authored. Whether or not he's in the "top x%" he seems clearly notable based on the press coverage per WP:PROF Criteria #1 and Example #2. AliveFreeHappy (talk) 22:05, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

yes,it does seem that way. DGG (talk) 05:06, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

• Keep Under the criteria of PROF, which are, I agree, less strict than other notability guidelines, he does seem to pass. After all, I doubt all phonologists teach at the Cambridge University, have a work published by one of the foremost academic publishing houses and have a law, even if crappy, named after them.--Aldux (talk) 16:01, 30 December 2007 (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.