Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Principles of energetics

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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. It is patently absurd to call these things Laws of Energetics. The first two or three are laws of thermodynamics and have been around forever. Most of the rest are either moot or proposed. To retain this article borders on the incoherent. I hope those expounding cleanup and de-POV get their writing boots on right now. I came this > < close to deleting anyway. I would observe that unreasoned votes in a debate such as this should be rejected out of hand. The article faces serious charges of WP:NOR and without justifying your vote one way or the other, you should expect short shrift from the admin trying to interpret the debate. It's pretty plain to me that this material belongs in an article about the academic, rather than an article pretending to be about principles of energetics, established or moot. -Splashtalk 02:17, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Principles of energetics

Article appears to be the original research of User:Sholto Maud, as per the discussion at ths articles talk page. (To be specific: the first three "principles" are centuries-old results from physics, yet are presented as if they were new-found jewels.) linas 02:02, 1 December 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)

  • Delete. linas 02:02, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Strong keep - this is based on H.T. Odum's work, are part of an established body of knowledge and are based on published research. Guettarda 02:10, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: It may be based on Odum's work; however, by the authors own admission, it is pure original research. I've nothing against Odum; however, this is not the right way to write about this stuff. linas 02:26, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
Allow me to be more precise: Odum appears to be an ecologist, yet this article appears to be about physics. As such, it would earn a failing grade if submitted as an essay in a college freshman physics class. There may be some principles of energetics that apply to ecology, but this article does not describe them.linas 03:28, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete. What is with the header on there? Seems like OR to me from that alone. Wikipedia is not the place for peer review of scholarly articles to take place. Peyna 02:21, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
A shame that wiki is not the place for peer review of scholarly articles. What is it for then? Sholto Maud 04:30, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
It is an encyclopedia. For a list of some things that Wikipedia is not, see WP:NOT. Peyna 05:01, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
I got rid of the header that was there and replaced with an {{original research}} tag. Peyna 02:42, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. I object to the label of "pure original research". I do not admit to this. Odum proposed principles 4, 5 and 6 and their corollaries in the referenced text. There needs to be an entry which details Odum's contribution to this field. I can write a different introduction, but Odum's proposals should be kept. If one reads Ecological and General Systems, one will find that Odum used the principles of physics to examine, model and analyse ecological systems beginning with analog electronic circuits. This reveals more about the ignorance of the AFD nomination than of any statement of fact about Odum's work. If there is "a right way to go about this stuff" then the author is invited to comment on this in the discussion section of the article.Sholto Maud 03:40, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
Present the information as an objective presentation of Odum's work. Then it might survive as an article. Peyna 03:58, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
How's does it read now?Sholto Maud 04:28, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
Not yet. Principles zero through four have got to go. Principle one is a quote from Sir Isaac Newton incorrectly attributed to someone from the 20th century. The 2nd and 3rd principles are taught in introductory freshman physics classes. Mis-stating basic principles of physics and attributing them to Odum is wrong. Odum is a smart guy; this article makes him look like a crank. linas 05:21, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep with a cleanup εγκυκλοπαίδεια* (talk) 04:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete. Put any useful information in Energetics. It sure needs the boost. --Apostrophe 05:19, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. The intention was not to "Mis-state basic principles of physics" nor to attribute any of the first 4 to Odum. Principle one was not a quote from Newton, but correctly attributed to Hertz. The intention was to give Odum's statement of the principles in his words, and those leading up to them. I will remove the contents. I was wrong to think that wiki, like the principles of scince, was collaborative and emergent. My apologies. I yeild Sholto Maud 05:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete until it gains acceptance by scientists in that field. -- Kjkolb 05:54, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete per nom. Ifnord 05:55, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete original research. I draw the court's attention to the second paragraph: This article pays tribute to Odum's statement of the principles of Energetics. Reference to the first four principles are included only to orient the reader and contextualise Odum's work. As noted, some researchers consider the Onsager reciprocal relations are loosely held to be the fourth principle, and so the situation is moot. Are we here to pay tribute? I think not. Is that paragraph comprehensible to a general readership, as the second introductory paragraph of an article might be expected to be? I'd say not, and some of my best friends are chemists. Is the subject of Energetics covered? Why yes it is! So did the author expand that? No, they just added a link to the new article and pasted in their end-of-term paper. And does this article have much substantive content beyond the flummery at the top? Actually not much, and some of it is speculative. If anyone feels wqualified to judge how much of this is verifiable then do feel free to merge it, the redirect will not, I think, be needed. - Just zis  Guy, you know? [T]/[C] (W) AfD? 17:30, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Apology My apology to the court. I have been a little desparate in my recent words & not used to the the level of attention, voting & review. Wiki has been of great benefit. I honour you all for your attention to this work. Odum was a great thinker, but we need not tribute. I get the feeling that there is some acceptance for the need of an article on energetics, and such an article might be the most appropriate place for some acknowledgement of Odum's proposals re 4th, 5th & 6th principles. If the court approves of such, I seek help in merging and non-original researching the history of energetics together with a better statement of Odum's work. I do not have alot of time, but I am at your service. Sholto Maud 07:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep and continue Cleanup. I did some copy-editing to make it more encyclopedic, but it could do with more by someone with greater subject knowledge. The suggestion to merge is also one with merit considering the short length of the Energetics article.--eleuthero 19:24, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep and cleanup. Gazpacho 00:08, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep, remove POV and rewrite. Karol 06:00, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: it is true that H. T. Odum was one of the founders of ecology. It is equally true that many early workers in this field seized upon thermodynamics and later information theory without really having a proper understanding of these rather abstract subjects, and hence came to grief in various ways which are still not well appreciated by many ecologists. OTH, as Linas's comment shows, not many physicists or mathematicians are aware of how physics and math has been used (abused) in ecology to dress up in fancy language some very questionable ideas. My point is that I think it would be valuable to have articles addressing the uses/misuses of mathematical and physical concepts in ecology, but sadly, I don't think many are well qualified to do this. No-one should attempt who has not studied at the very least ecology, thermodynamics, and information theory textbooks at the graduate level as well as having studied the relevant literature in all of those subjects, which is absolutely vast. So, while I agree in principle with those who suggested that the article be kept but greatly improved, I fear that that (unless I take a hand myself) the chances of this happening anytime soon are slim indeed.---CH 03:21, 3 December 2005 (UTC) (For those who know me mainly for my gtr interests, in previous instars I studied information theory and ecology.)
Even if this page were to be stripped of 99% of its content and remain a stub for 3 years... that is still not a reason to delete it, the way I view Wikipedia at least. I have encountered so many pages on less obscure topics that haven't been able to crawl out of the stub phase; but that is OK, as long as there is no OR and POV in them. Karol 16:26, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep but with plenty of conditions. I basically agree with Karol. I went surfing and found this web page by H.T. Odum which is very enlightening. Odum is struggling with a legitimate question - the transformation and use of energy by life forms, particularly humans, and is genuinely attempting to use scientific concepts to deal with it, but as a hard science it falls short. He needs, as Karol said above, a better understanding of thermodynamics and information theory. I think a lot of people have picked up on the buzzwords, but have less understanding of the scientific aspects than even Odum had. It is an article about a legitimate object of study, but its going to take some serious work by some ground-based personnel to keep it from becoming a pseudo-scientific babblefest. PAR 18:31, 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.