Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jonathan Sarfati(2)

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. - Bobet 13:35, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Jonathan Sarfati

Jonathan Sarfati (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Sarfati is not sufficiently notable as either a creationist or as a chess player. Sarfati fails WP:BIO. In the previous AfD of this article(which ended with no consensus) I argued for keeping the article since additional sources had been provided by David D and because Sarfati was frequently mentioned at scienceblogs.com (which is a reliable source for most purposes). However, none of these sources mention him in a non-trivial fashion or were discussions in the comments section which are for obvious reasons, not reliabe. Even the most non-trivial of the sources simply argue against arguments he has made. A list of newspaper articles were also given in the last AfD. However, most of those are op-eds which mention Sarfati in passing or other articles which have a short blurb from him.

The claim that he is notable as a chess player is also not credible — there are no non-trivial sources about him as a chess player, and one could even argue that the current chess section constitutes a synthesis that just barely survives Wikipedia's no original research policy. Even if you google for "Jonathan Sarfati" + chess the first two pages of hits have three chess pages that mention him; the rest are creationism related sites, evolution related sites, or Wikipedia and its mirrors. The closest to anything notable about chess that I can find is that his chess standings in some tournaments have been mentioned in newspaper chess columns. See for example [1]. Some of the chess hits are just his reviews of chess books on Amazon.com such as [2]. It took me a long time to acknowledge/realize this since creationism is an issue I'm very interested in, but the conclusion is unmistakable: Sarfati is not notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. JoshuaZ 00:11, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Comment "No consensus" is highly disingenuous — it was about 2-1 for keeping! Looks like his detractors will keep trying in the hope of succeeding.58.162.2.122 09:31, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

• Tentative Keep Found one mainstream city newspaper article which supports claim that the creationist Jonathan Sarfati was a national chess champion for NZ ("EX-WGTN MAN'S BOOK ON EVOLUTION POPULAR", Bob Shaw, 291 words, 5 February 2001, The Evening Post (NZ) via Factiva - this article also suggestst that Sarfati was quite successful as a creationist author in NZ and the US, although the journalist writes that 250,000 of his main book are "in print" rather than actually sold - this sounds like misleading inflation of a subject). A Jonathan Sarfati is listed as a national champion on a website which seems to be the official NZ chess association site (though its a bit of amateurish website)[3][4]. There's almost enough proof here for a solidly referenced claim that he is a national chess champion. No opinion on the creationist stuff - didn't look into it once the chess angle seemed to be checking out. I agree that the article should be pruned to avoid the impression of puffery / resume abuse of wikipedia. I'm also certainly open to counterarguments showing that Sarfati's claims to chess championship are dubious. Bwithh 00:32, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
  • If you are still in doubt, see the official NZ chess site, the Chessgames list (which includes championship games), and most importantly, the Olimpbase list from FIDE. Furthermore, the official FIDE website confirms conclusively that it is the same person. 00:31, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
    • Comment But none of this helps much in regard to him actually meeting WP:BIO. JoshuaZ 00:38, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
      • Since WP:BIO states 'Sportspeople/athletes/competitors who have played in a fully professional league, or a competition of equivalent standing in a non-league sport ... or at the highest level in mainly amateur sports or other competitive activities that are themselves considered notable', it does help in regard to him actually meeting that guideline. Also, a 2006 Australian Chess Federation newsletter, as pointed out previously in this article's discussion page, stated that he was a champion chess player of New Zealand ('Simultaneous Blindfold Chess Exhibition: Former New Zealand Champion FM Dr Jonathan Sarfati will play a simultaneous blindfold exhibition at Croydon Chess on Saturday, 11 February 2006 at 4pm. If time permits this will be followed by a regular simul') who is still actively recognised in the chess community. 58.162.2.122 08:49, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep He has written a number of books and was a member of AiG, which is definitely notable. The Chess stuff, on the other hand is not notable, and I suspect added by himself or his wife, using a pseudonym. The Chess info deserves a single sentence. Ashmoo 00:37, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I disagree that multiple book authorship and/or membership of AiG]] are sufficient as proof of encyclopedic notability. Bwithh 00:40, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Sarfati works for Creation Ministries International not AiG.60.242.13.87 01:34, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Being a member of AIG is not by itself notable (there are many people who work for AIG who are not notable). Writing books also by itself does not confer notability. Again, the primary criterion is whether there exist non-trivial, independent, reliable sources. I am unable to find any and all that we have above are a few mentions. JoshuaZ 00:47, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

By "reliable", Joshua means "non-Christian".60.242.13.87 02:42, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. I sat out the last AfD because I couldn't make up my mind, but Joshua's arguments are compelling. Guettarda 00:48, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep mainly due to his notable published refutations of the PBS series and Scientific American articles. ^rossnixon 00:58, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment And what evidence is there that any of them are notable? None of them has been reviewed in any newspapers, none of them have been discussed widely outside internet fora and usenet. JoshuaZ 01:13, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
  • reply Checking up...another of his books may be more notable. Ken Ham (AiG) says "Well, I believe, personally, that your book, Refuting Compromise, is a classic on the same scale as 'The Genesis Flood'."(A well known classic)[5]^rossnixon 09:37, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
    • So someone from the same organizations that Sarfati works with and published the book says that the book is well known? Forgive me if that seems like less than a strong claim of notability. JoshuaZ 16:05, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
      • Yet his books have sold better than the likes of Sam Harris (author), who is also not as well qualified in science (yet to finish his doctorate), and has never won a national championship in any sport or game. But JoshuaZ probably gives Harris a free pass because he shares his atheistic faith, yet WP:BIO says nothing about such blatant viewpoint discrimination.60.242.13.87 01:34, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per Elenagirl and Moreschi in the previous deletion debate at [Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jonathan Sarfati]. This link should have been provided in the nomination. Edison 06:16, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

• Undecided If the facts in the article are as stated I think he is might be notable enough. If he was really chess champion of New Zealand that should be good enough by itself, many much less accomplished sports figures have articles here. If he wrote three books which were published, not self published, that should be good enough too. I don't think that membership in an organization by itself makes a person notable however. Steve Dufour 06:38, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
• keep on balance. This is tricky, because there are several partial claims. I think the real reason the articles was intended was for him as a creationist who happens to have done a small amount of published scientific work in an unrelated field. The NZ chess championship should be very easy to confirm, and is enough by itself as for any other sport. Three published books is not, unless they have some success, but these just might have done so. DGG 06:41, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
  • And I trust that this has now been confirmed well enough for even the most ardent detractor. 60.242.13.87 02:51, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
• Delete •Jim62sch• 11:56, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
• Abstain as I have a conflict of interest. However, I was given to understand that Safarti was notable within the Creation/Evolution debate, and that the current "hot topic" nature of that debate would suffice for WP:NOT guidelines. Justin Eiler 12:45, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep - I am president of one of the chess clubs (www.croydonchess.com) which has hosted Jonathan Sarfati for a blindfold simul and can confirm the other chess references above as regards his chess history (e.g. chessgames.com). I frankly suspect the Sarfati article is being targeted for deletion because of his creationist position. Shall we now go on a witch hunt and target, for example, PZ Myers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PZ_Myers) whose claim to fame appears to be threefold: he is a professor, he is a trenchant critic of creationists, he runs a blog. Doesn't appear to have anything like the bibliography attributed to Sarfati. Frosty 02:06, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
  • This doesn't have anything to do with Sarfati being a creationist. If you noticed, the last time this article was nominated for deletion the current nominator (me) argued for keeping the article. In any event refferences to PZ Myers are at best an argument of the form WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS and not terribly useful. In general, Wikipedians are not inclined to listen to arguments claiming that deletions are occuring out of bias. While the chess success may be an indication of notability, we still don't have multiple, non-trivia, independent reliable sources about Sarfati which as discussed in Wikipedia's biography policy is the most fundamental issue. JoshuaZ 02:28, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
    • This is disingenuous. JoshuaZ has a history of antagonism towards creationists, including abusing his power by banning some of them for trying to inject some fairness e.g. by removing unsourced claims as per Wiki's verification policy, while deleting sourced criticism of antitheists in their article pages. As an admin with such blatant bias, he should recuse himself from editing such articles.
    • Philip J. Rayment rightly pointed out during the last deletion attempt: 'I struggle to find an evolutionist on Wikipedia with a section titled "criticisms" or similar, but on Wikipedia it's considered POV to simply describe a creationist's beliefs. And some of the criticisms are presented as truth, such as "those scientists do not demonstrate any manifestation of religious faith". The only POV in this article is an anti-creationist one.'
    • In any case, JoshuaZ has produced nothing at all that wasn't discussed previously, when the attempt to delete was rejected 2-1. It is highly improper to keep trying so soon after. Nothing has changed since he wrote: "Keep per sources from David D. Also if it counts at all he has been frequently rebutted at Scienceblogs which has in the past been considered to meet WP:RS. JoshuaZ 23:10, 16 November 2006 (UTC)" And as shown, winning the chess championship of his country is sufficient by itself for an article entry.60.242.13.87 02:51, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• • Sarfati is not only mentioned in a nontrivial capacity, his work has been the subject of several rebuttals on TalkOrigins. The detractors can't have it both ways, and need to decide whether TalkOrigins is a reliable source, as they have previously stated, or it isn't and therefore should not be allowed to be cited as a WP:RS for any article on Wikipedia because WP:RS cannot be cherry-picked to suit an editor's whim. As only one example of many WP:RS (NAiG, ChristianAnswers.net, Tekton Apologetics Ministries, Scott E.C. and Branch G. (2003), etc.) that have either featured, written about, or rebutted Sarfati. 58.162.2.122 08:24, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of New Zealand-related deletions.
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletions. -gadfium 02:55, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Very strong keep. I don't see why there's any debate. His chess record alone is enough. -- Avenue 03:18, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Delete: I don't think this is NPOV for one, and I don't think the guy is noteworthy. Kripto 04:05, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Keep for the chess record alone. It seems clear from websearching that he's been the NZ champion once and represented the country at the chess olympiad more than once. Although he does not seem to have played ranked chess for the last 7+ years there will certainly be enough material to write about his chess career in a NPOV and verified way. Has played a sport at the highest level in his country and clearly meets WP:BIO. Deserves a lot of cleaning up rather than deleting - Peripitus (Talk) 06:05, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• • My sources tell me that his picture has been on the front cover of New Zealand Chess, the official publication of the NZ Chess Federation, quite a number of times, e.g. when he won the title of NZ Champion. JoshuaZ's searches are likely biased towards American ones, and against publications from pre-Internet days (e.g. Sarfati's title was in 1988), so would not pick up on these. An international encyclopedia should be neither Americocentric nor ageist.60.242.13.87 06:54, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Very emphatic keep - there ought to be a policy of banning users who repeatedly RE-nominate for deletion that have survived such votes in the recent past. At a minimum, there should be a period of 12 months between votes for deletion on a single article. Now, to the point. This guy was New Zealand's chess champion. Isn't that notable? David Cannon 10:31, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

• Very strong keep per Avenue. To quote: I don't see why there's any debate. His chess record alone is enough. -- Avenue Mathmo ^Talk 11:38, 7 February 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.