Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of coincidences

This page is an archive of the proposed deletion of the article below. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page, if it exists; or after the end of this archived section. The result of the debate was Delete --Allen3 ^talk July 4, 2005 17:15 (UTC)

[edit] List of coincidences

Not encylopedic. Not managable. A friend called while I was thinking about her. Should I add that to the page? --Xcali 00:46, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Delete. Even if it was the List of well-known coincidences, it's still not encyclopedic. Nestea 00:50, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Keep useful list of notable (supposed) coincidences. I recommand Xcali not adding anything to the list which isn't widely known. Kappa 00:52, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• What I had in mind (in creating this article) was that it should only list coincidences which are significant, e.g. surrounding historical events. (Rubric at the start of the article could set out what would count.) There are many notable historical examples of remarkable coincidences, some of which had important consequences (and are worthy of collection in one place). I know the article doesn't have much of this yet, but I only created it a few minutes ago! Re the encyclopedic point, if Mathematical coincidence is legitimate (effectively a list of mathematical coincidences) then surely a more general list of coincidences (including reference to the mathematical ones) also should be. Ben Finn 00:59, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, as there are coincidences happening all the time. Something mentioned in the main article should be enough. -Feydey 01:12, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete ne and unmaintanable. The 'coincidences' in mathematics and physics are matters of absolute, immutable fact. They are not really coincidences; they're just dressed up that way in the lay press. The maths ones in particular are actually useful approximations for the most part. I had soup for lunch today, and today is/was Saturday. They begin with the same letter! Had better add it to this list.-Splash 01:20, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • The list now states: "Only coincidences which are well-known, or which involve well-known people or events, should be included." Kappa 13:32, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Well the maths coincidences aren't in the List of coincidences article (just linked to from it). So are you requesting that Mathematical coincidence be deleted?? Ben Finn 01:28, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • That's not what I said at all. I was making the point that you were defending this page of genuine coincidences on the basis that there was another page of coincidence, which the maths page is not all. The maths 'coincidences' are not coincidences at all, but hard facts, and approximations of encyc value because they are widely used within the numerate-sciences. See the talk page for some others' feelings on this point. The page under this VfD lists mere happenstance, see the tongue-in-cheek examples already suggested.-Splash 01:36, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. *makes some immature comment relating Xcali to cooties* – ugen64 01:24, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Keep Amazon lists over 350 BOOKS on the subject and Google yields over five million hits; obviously there is a strong interest in this topic that nothing else in Wiki satisfies. I think the problem is that the article at this point is nothing but a stub. Once people begin improving it, it should be a fine addition to the Wikipedia. Anyway, the poor thing has only been alive for a few hours, IMHO you’re being a little quick on the trigger in trying to quash it, and pretty viscous on the attacks. The jibes about soup on Saturday and girlfriends calling are the same as deleting List of famous dogs because none of my dachshunds are listed, or deleting List of famous American houses because Jimmy Wales’ house didn’t make the cut. Wiki is chock full of trivial lists with arbitrary “lower limits” on what is or is not included (570 just that start with ‘a’), and NONE of them mention your girlfriend or your soup. Kevin Wells 01:43, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment Well, I might consider keeping a page about books about coincidences because that would be maintainable for a start. This page is simply not — there can be no justification for excluding any coincidence - just try applying a notability criterion to coincidences - some people would deny they even happened, or that they were coincidental.-Splash 02:09, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • When I do it, an Amazon "Books" search for "list of coincidences" returns just 16 books, not 350, including books which are quite obviously not about this topic at all such as Murder List : A Novel, Arco Reading Lists for College-Bound Students (Reading Lists for College-Bound Students), Ego Trip's Book of Rap Lists, and The A List: The National Society of Film Critics' 100 Essential Films. There are plenty of books on Amazon about the subject of coincidence, but then we already have an article on that, and that isn't the article at hand. Uncle G 10:32, 2005 Jun 19 (UTC)
• Delete Woah, dude, the other day, I found a quarter on the sidewalk. And then I realised I was on 25th street... and a quarter is worth 25 cents. Dude. Woah. Ok, seriously, this is one of those extremely open-ended lists that almost anything could be added to. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 01:44, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • The list now states: "Only coincidences which are well-known, or which involve well-known people or events, should be included." Kappa 13:32, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete or merge to the existing list at Coincidence. --Tabor 02:02, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete - many of these coincidences may be worthy of mention within the topic article, but they have no connection to each other. You might as well as List of historical figures with nine-letter names. - DavidWBrooks 02:12, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete or merge with Coincidence. Many of the items in the list are already on that page. Pburka 02:16, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Each of these coincidences can be mentioned in the main article about the associated topic. --Canderson7 03:19, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • So you won't allow me any way to find actual examples of coincidences? Kappa 03:54, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Xe hasn't suggested stopping you from going to coincidence and reading the examples given there. Uncle G 10:32, 2005 Jun 19 (UTC)
      • True, but will Xe accept all coincidences with articles being listed in coincidence? Kappa 12:05, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

*Delete - Keeping a list of coincidences is a ridiculous proposition. --Barfooz (talk) 04:40, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC) - vote withdrawn --Barfooz (talk) 19:59, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Delete unmaintainable list. JamesBurns 05:00, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Silly list, the number of potential coincidences (even among notable things) is too high to warrant a reasonable article. This is not an encyclopedic topic. --Fastfission 06:36, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete - coincidences aren't encyclopedic. Radiant_>|< 08:46, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• As per Starblind, this list's selection criteria (Wikipedia:Lists (stand-alone lists)) are practically non-existent. Talk:coincidence makes for informative reading, furthermore. Delete. Uncle G 10:32, 2005 Jun 19 (UTC)
• OK folks, for what it's worth I've beefed the hours-old article up slightly with headings and a few more entries which illustrate (I hope) that this article would be manageable and not just a random jumbled collection. Does this sway anyone? Ben Finn 12:19, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete - lest I be tempted to add coincidences that I experience everyday. Craigy (talk) 12:25, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • The list now states: "Only coincidences which are well-known, or which involve well-known people or events, should be included." Kappa 13:32, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Yes, but that'll mean we have to have a VfD (or a VfErasure) on each entry in the list which is still unmaintanable. Given how hard it can be to establish (non-)notability for actual people, it would be mousebutton-destroying trying to do it for every happenstance that comes along.-Splash 14:02, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Comment – as the devil's advocate, or maybe Badukuk's, I propose there are no coincidences. Seriously - this is far more about the concept of Synchronicity. I'd say a list of well-known synchronistic events (such as some of the ones on this not well-named list), would most definitely be encyclopedic. See references at Synchronicity. I don't agree that this is a silly, unmaintainable list or ridiculous proposition at all. But it does need some work to be kept. --Mothperson 13:28, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • The fact that some people believe there is no such thing as a coincidence, and that apparent coincidences are a result of some underlying cause, makes it all the more important for an NPOV encyclopedia to cover them. Kappa 13:37, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Comment My final word on all this (having done a little more beefing up on the article) is that while I don't claim a list of coincidences would be of great academic worth (which is I think what is meant by the 'not encyclopedic' criticism), it would be of considerable curiosity value, which is a legitimate (though admittedly lesser) purpose of quite a few existing Wikipedia articles. I cite as examples of this the List of strange units of measurement and List of deaths by accidental drug overdose, which have little academic value but considerable curiosity value. And I argue that a list of coincidences would be of greater interest to many readers than some of the existing lists. I am happy to spend time myself adding to and maintaining it (as I have already done on the curiosity-value List of premature obituaries which I started recently). The existing Coincidence article cites a couple of examples of coincidences (which could be moved to this new page), and links to some See Also topics, but is not itself a list of coincidences. Finally, I think the few examples I've put in so far demonstrate that the page would be more than a mere list of trivia, as aside from its intrinsic interest it would (when fleshed out with more instances) link to and encourage browsing of a wide range of people, events and topics. Ben Finn 13:41, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Strong Keep --Mothperson 14:12, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC) Withdrawing vote as pointless (my vote, not the subject – - I'm still more impressed by Jung and Koestler than by the reasoning behind the delete votes here) --Mothperson 21:36, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, non-encyclopedic, trivial, unmaintainable. — mark ✎ 15:30, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, in agreement with most others above. (What a coincidence!) Jonathunder 15:45, 2005 Jun 19 (UTC)
• Delete, not encyclopedic. RickK 20:25, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete not encyclopedic CDC (talk) 20:36, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Keep, but change name to List of famous coincidences.Howabout1 ^{Talk to me!} 20:46, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Because of the majority of delete votes, I have created a copy of this page in my user space. Howabout1 ^{Talk to me!} 20:55, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. NPOV. The article's title and content are biased and subjective by definition. According to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, a coincidence is a "sequence of events that although accidental seems to have been planned or arranged." "To seem" means "To give the impression of being". Coincidences are not factual by nature. Coincidences are actually opinions about facts, and shouldn't be presented as facts. In contrast, "a mathematical coincidence can be said to occur when two expressions show a near-equality that lacks direct theoretical explanation". They are not opinions but factual assertions. --Edcolins 20:51, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • Mathematical coincidence should probably also be deleted, or moved to Mathematical curiosities or Numerical curiosities. --Edcolins 21:16, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • There's something of a discussion on that article's talk page about that, which seems unresolved.-Splash 17:17, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Pavel Vozenilek 21:01, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Even if only limited to notable/non-trivial events, maintaining such a list is an unmanageably large task and the content does not strike me as encyclopedic. Fernando Rizo 21:06, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Keep, interesting list. I don't see why it should be unmanageable if it is limited to notable events, or why it should be unencyclopedic. Martg76 21:27, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Because we'd have to debate each entry on the list for notability which is hard enough to establish with actual, real people (and bands, schools etc etc).-Splash 17:17, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

• Delete -- Not maintainable, composed primarily of factoids. Haikupoet 04:16, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete -- Not maintainable, nonencyclopedic. carmeld1 16:39, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete unmaintainable nonencyclopedic list. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:02, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete drini ☎ 21:06, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be placed on a related article talk page, if one exists; in an undeletion request, if it does not; or below this section.