Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Three men make a tiger

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. Cobra 22:54, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Three men make a tiger

I know this is well written, but why is a Chinese proverb here in an English Wikipedia? This should rightly be in a Chinese dictionary. Mandel 01:08, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep. Notable enough. Illustrates a particular type of logical fallacy. Useful.--Aleron235 01:20, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
  • But you haven't explain why a Chinese proverb should be here. Or Russian, or Arabian, or African, or Spanish. We already have a perfect expression for this in argumentum ad populum. We are not Chinese lexicographers, nor is this a dictionary. Mandel 01:27, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
    • If we are not Russian lexicographers, would you propose that Category:Soviet phraseology be deleted? Shawnc 07:19, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
    • OK, on hindsight maybe one should merge and delete into argumentum ad populum. No one in the right mind will go search for a Chinese proverb here in the English Wikipedia. Mandel 01:27, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. Chinese proverb articles have a place in an English language Wkipedia as long as they are written in the English language (and they are notable, etc.) --Elliskev 01:29, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
  • I disagree totally. Unless an expression is commonly used in the English language, who would search for it in Wikipedia? Via the same argument all proverbs are notable, all languages are notable, and therefore Wikipedia should include every single proverb from every single language on earth. That, however, would suit another project better than an encyclopedia. Mandel 01:38, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
    • 99% of articles on Wikipedia have names that nobody would ever look up. But, someone might stumble on it, and it has merit as an interesting article. (99% is totally made up) --Elliskev 01:48, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
      • It'll be a sad day when a researcher has to stumble on something useful in Wikipedia. Furthermore, if you don't know Chinese (I reckon > 99% of the users here don't), how would you check this expression up? If you do know Chinese, would you be searching for this in an English-language Wikipedia? Mandel 02:05, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
        • I took one year of Chinese and I'm interested in this culture. However I could not use the Chinese Wikipedia because I don't know Chinese all that well. All I can say is things like "I'm an American" and "I'm going to the bookstore." I wouldn't have looked this up on my own, but I'm glad I learned it now. I'm not sure if it should be a stand alone article, but I'm not sure I would favor a merge to argumentum ad populum. If my interest is Chinese sayings, which it can be, I wouldn't look there. Although I guess a merge implies that this becomes a redirect, so maybe.--T. Anthony 09:05, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I didn't say 'has to stumble,' I said might stumble. What's the Random Article link for? Anyway, I'm off topic. My reason for keep is that I see nothing wrong with the article. Your nom reason is that it's a Chinese proverb in an English Wikipedia. I rebut by saying that it's not an English Wikipedia, it's an English language Wikipedia. --Elliskev 03:15, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

You lost me. Well, pressing on Random Article mean you intend to stumble on something, don't you? Say I want to search for Arabic proverbs, but I don't know Arabian, so how do I know what to search for? Furthermore, no traditional encyclopedia in the world provides interlanguage links to proverbs. Mandel 04:13, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry. I guess I don't know how to say it any more clearly. I think the article has merit on its own and should stay. --Elliskev 14:21, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

You can read Proverb, click on List_of_proverbs->Arabic_proverbs and learn "If you had an opinion you better be determined". For the phrases among those that have historical significance or background, I would also enjoy reading more about them in an expanded article complete with wikified and external links. Shawnc 07:09, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

We're not a traditional encyclopedia, notably in that Wikipedia is not paper. We can afford to have obscure topics in our database (in fact, we want to: cf. "Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge"). In answer to your question, there are many translations of non-English works that preserve the original phrasings, proverbs, maxims, etc. as they were said in the native language, so that the idiom remains intact (the I Ching springs to mind as a good example). Thus, it is a simple matter to need an explanation for a proverb in a language you don't speak, such as this. In regards to your concern that this won't be found except through Special:Random, I'd like to note that this article is hardly an orphan. You can check for yourself at Special:Whatlinkshere/Three men make a tiger. Blackcap (talk) 19:57, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

There's also Category:Proverbs.--T. Anthony 09:07, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep, But replace the 'Original Text' section with a link to a foregin language site. Although someone might not search for this by the subject line, it can be linked from other articles and be searched by content. xaosflux ^T/_C 02:02, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
  • The original text is now moved to Chinese Wikiquotes. Shawnc 06:53, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Speedy redirect to argumentum ad populum --YixilTesiphon ^{Say hello} Consider my Wikiproject idea 06:35, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Comments by creator:

Accessibility to non-Chinese readers: this and other articles can easily be found via links. In this case: Chinese_language->Four-character idiom. Categories can also be used.

Inclusion of translated foreign expressions: it is stated in the first line of Wikipedia that the project is meant to be multi-lingual. Wikipedia is not a traditional encyclopedia, and is not bound by traditional limitations (Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia). A notable term or idea need not be from a particular language in order to have a place in any version of Wikipedia, even if the term is not typically used in the translated language. The "three men" article is not simply a translation of a random phrase, but is an elaboration of a notable phrase (over 30,000 hits) which independently illustrates a common logical fallacy. Other foreign expressions have their own articles as well, even with less hits; "And you are lynching Negroes" exists and is not redirected to Ad hominem or Two wrongs make a right because it is culturally notable (see below).

Problems with merge/redirection: there are problems with merging the article to Argumentum ad populum:

If the text existed under the "Argumentum" page, it could no longer be categorized under both Category:Chinese proverbs and Category:Logical fallacies, which means that the concept would be more difficult to find for those only interested in Chinese proverbs.

The article indeed started out in Appeal to belief, the predecessor to "Argumentum ad populum", but was moved to its own article because the Chinese phrase is not meaningful without the full story and translation, which would appear disproportionally large and out of place in those articles.

Possible alternative approach: move the full translation to Wikiquotes but leave a brief explanation in Wikipedia. A downside to this is that it somewhat disrupts the presentation. Shawnc 06:49, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep and link to it from Argumentum ad populum and/or fallacious argument. Wikipedia is international, and the saying is indeed fairly widespread. B.Wind 07:24, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. And I suggest consensus to keep. Ben Aveling 10:34, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Strong keep. Culturally significant proverbs from foreign languages, explained in English, meet reasonable standards of noteworthiness. Smerdis of Tlön 15:13, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. This violates no policies, guidelines, or even proposals; it is not unencyclopedic; the proverb in question is notable. To delete an article simply because it discusses a non-English topic would be ludicrous: WP:CSB stands for "countering systemic bias", not "creating" it. — Haeleth Talk 15:17, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. Can see no reason for it to be on AfD, much less get deleted. Turnstep 16:00, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep or merge with a redirect. This is good stuff. AndyJones 17:46, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep - I found it by linking from the Style over substance fallacy page to the logical fallacies category page and from there to the Three men make a tiger page because it sounded interesting. So a person doesn't have to know about the Chinese proverb to be able find it - I found it without knowing anything about it - and it was a useful page to me. If it were written in Chinese, I would be dumber than I am now.  :-) --Rcronk 19:15, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. A culturally popular proverb is more than valid for inclusion, regardless of whether the proverb was originally in a language that is not English. --Apostrophe 19:37, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep per all, esp. per Elliskev. Blackcap (talk) 19:57, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep per above arguments. Punkmorten 21:36, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete per nominator. Stifle 00:02, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

The nominator's concern was that the phrase is non-English, but this concern is unnecessary because there currently exists a large amount of such phrases on the English Wikipedia. See Category:Phrases. Some examples include Bhinneka Tunggal Ika, Kalos Kagathos, Shikata ga nai, Liberté, égalité, fraternité, Kinder, Küche, Kirche, Raubwirtschaft, They shall not pass, We will bury you, Glasnost, By administrative means, Mutatis mutandis... Shawnc 23:34, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep per above arguments. Herostratus 05:04, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
• Strong Keep I "stumbled onto" this very interesting article today in precisely the way one of the deleters above seemed to be arguing shouldn't happen, and from there onto the Four-character Idioms page... that's what Wikipedia's supposed to be all about, and it's one of my favorite things about this place! (I started out by looking up Whisky!) Link it however you like, but don't delete it. --Arvedui 03:02, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep - tidbits like this make wikipedia interesting novacatz 17:00, 11 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.