Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Luboš Motl

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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 keep. howcheng {chat} 23:08, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Luboš Motl

If we are to judge Motl based solely upon his work, that is, his publications, it is obvious that he is only an average string theorist who is pretty much unnotable. He hasn't made any notable or groundbreaking contributions to physics and his papers, which are often coauthored with other more famous physicists are run-of-the-mill papers. The Czech textbook on linear algebra which he has coauthored isn't notable either. His only claim to fame/notability is his very active and aggressive presence on the internet (the usenet, various blogs and Wikipedia) where he frequently peppers his speech with invectives. In fact, his mere active presence isn't enough to contribute to his noteriety. There are many other physicists who also have an active presence on the internet but they don't stand out anywhere near as much because they don't litter their writings with hateful speech. They tend to blend in with the background, so to speak.

Not only that, this page is a vanity page of Lumidek, which is the user name of Motl here at Wikipedia.

I am not qualified to judge Mott's contribution to string theory. But through his blog, translations and work on Wikipendia he has certainly made significant contributions to the popular understanding of String Theory.

  • Keep. Junior Fellow at Harvard, Assistant Professor at Harvard; either Harvard is slipping up, or the derogatory comments above are misplaced. As the nominator has crossed swords here with User:Lumidek (Motl), I favour the idea that this is mostly spite. Charles Matthews 20:11, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep per above. -- JJay 22:00, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete String theorists of Motl's caliber are a dime a dozen. He hasn't even published in a year and a half.
    • See the recent paper [1]. --66.31.40.103 16:24, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
    • My goodness! Some people publish every three months. But we don't make that a reason for including them. Counting papers is almost as silly as weighing them. Charles Matthews
    • Harvard Assistant Professors, while not a dime-a-dozen, are not exactly noteworthy in themselves. Consider, by way of normalization, this recently deleted entry (CSD A7). The subject is a former Princeton Assistant Professor (now Full Professor at UT Austin), has a prominent physics blog, etc, etc.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.126.243.35 (talk • contribs) 07:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
    • Comment: Your link does not work. However, if it did, it would probably be a good example of the widespread abuse of CSD. The comparison, in any event, is not relevant.-- JJay 07:46, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. I am not qualified to judge his scientific work and I have no illusions about it. I dislike Lumo for personal reasons and the article is mostly written by himself as a vanity page. Nevertheless, he is one of the notable persons on Czech Internet and elsewhere. His contributions on popularization of physics are significant. We shall keep the article. --Egg ✉ 17:39, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep - he's a significant popularizer in Czechia. His translations are on a top level. Miraceti 17:53, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Weak keep because of his "notoriety" on Czech internet and popularisation work. The page should be trimmed down on trivia. I have no idea how important in long term is the work as physicist, use of Category:Czech physicists may be reconsidered (will he pass 10 years test?) Pavel Vozenilek 22:40, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
One to add: there are more known Category:Czech bloggers than Motl. Pavel Vozenilek 22:42, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. Lubos is a brilliant if unorthodox young theoretical physicist; his papers on Matrix Theory were ground-breaking. What his long term impact will be is as yet unclear. He plays a central role in the article by JAMES GLANZ (NYT) May 1, 2001 about the role of the internet in research.--[MR]
  • Delete nn and vanity. Sarah Ewart 22:44, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep - I think he's notable enough. -lethe talk 11:38, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep - I strongly oppose deletion. I was going to translate to portuguese when I saw the deletion tag. Sad. User:Mdob | [[User talk:Mdob|Talk]] 00:08, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep - Notable enough -- that he is known to be somehat grumpy as Wikipedian, on his blog and in USENET is no reason to delete --Pjacobi 14:44, 4 January 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.