Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Evolution (term)

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 NO CONSENSUS TO DELETE. For whatever it's worth, the raw numbers are 6-5 in favor of Keep. There was one suggestion to Merge with the disambiguation page, but disambiguation pages are supposed to be as spare as practicable. Clearly there is more here than can be contained in either a disambiguation page or in a Wiktionary dictionary definition. It seems a little fishy to me to have an article on a term, and I don't know if we want to go down that road for very many words, but there are a few words that merit it, I guess. I think the Delete arguments are cogent and strong, but I don't see them as strong enough to gain the article's deletion. Herostratus 07:25, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Evolution (term)

Evolution (term) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Cross between a disambig (which already exists at Evolution (disambiguation)) and a dicdef - or more accurately, a bundle of dicdefs. No sense in having this "article" at all, as it reproduces the content and use of the disambig page, less well. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:10, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

• Comment (or more like a question): Can this material be moved to the diambiguation page? Or is it the wrong format? Can it be merged with something? I personally have used this article a couple of times and I admit I was a bit surprised to find two sort of disambiguation pages (Evolution (term) and Evolution (disambiguation)) It would be helpful to have them all on one. I also am a big fan of etymology, which really is not an encyclopedia function but more of a dictionary function I admit. But I still like etymologies. --Filll 21:20, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

  It is already on the Disambig page, without the brief summary statements - and there is a great deal more on the disambig page which is not here. The "groupings" of use are presented here in text, with a link to one article. On the disambig page, the "groupings" are presented by actual groupings within subsections, with links to all articles within the group. So while the explanatory text on this page might be interesting, the links presented are woefully incomplete and may give the reader the false impression that the term which is linked is the only example. In that sense, this page is inaccurate. KillerChihuahua^?!? 10:11, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

  It's also piffle. Additionally, Filll speaks of etymologies, but nowhere in the article is there a classical etymological example. Such an example would be thus:

  evolution < L. evolutionem, accusative of evolutio, n. of action < evolvere to roll out, unroll < e (ex) out + volvere to roll, turn < PIE *wel- , to roll, to turn. •Jim62sch• 23:12, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

  Ouch. There is not much content there, for such an important term.--Filll 23:18, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

  Perhaps. But what you are really refering to is semantics, not etymology. An etymology merely gives the source of the word tracing it through its "evolution", may offer cognates from other languages, and, if possible will go back to the probable PIE root. The differences of the senses of words is part of the study of semantics. Thus, what you really love is semantics.

To be honest, I think I like both. I like knowing why we have the words "ketchup" and "catsup" and that they are two different translitterations of a malay word imported into China for a fish sauce, for example.--Filll 15:04, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

• Note that I intentionally left out the cognates so as to not clutter the etymology. Had I decided to do a full-blown etymology, one which you would still find lacking, it would have looked as such:

  evolvere to roll out, unroll < e (ex) out + volvere to roll, turn, cognate of Gr ειλυειν", to roll up < PIE *wel- , to roll, to turn > PIE *welg > OE wealcan > ME walk, cognate to Ger walken, Frankish *walken.

  However, were I to do a semantic matrix, it would be much larger tracing the uses of the Latin word, as well as an similar processes among the cognates. However, in order to do so, I would, if I were to do it professionally, have to load it with semantic and linguistic terms that would likely make the matrix less graspable by a layperson than desired. •Jim62sch• 13:57, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

• Keep. This is useful information, more than a simple dicdef. It would unbalance the main Evolution page, and the dab page should be just that - a page which disambiguates the term, not a page which explains it. I would support removal of the links from the bottom of this page, though - one link to the dab page should be enough, and we already have that in the dab header. Tevildo 21:37, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
• In that case, Keep, unless someone can convince me otherwise.--Filll 21:40, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
• Merge with disambiguation page. If this information is important, then people who search for evolution in Wikipedia need to see it. TimVickers 00:40, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
• Keep and expand. A dab page is limited to providing links to other articles and very brief, non-paragraph descriptions. Evolution is a sufficiently important, and sufficially complicated and multi-faceted, word to merit a distinct article. This could prove to be an exceedingly valuable page if we start using it to present the many different definitions of "evolution" not only in different scientific fields or colloquial contexts, but also as it's understood differently by, for example, various creationists. We lack a page for exploring the ambiguity and conflict over how to define evolution in various contexts, and this could easily serve that role. -Silence 11:53, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
• Delete. Wikipedia is not a dictionary. The only new ingredient in this article that does not appear in the (much more comprehensive) disambiguation page is the etymology. The etymology could be salvaged and added in to the main biological evolution page, or just deleted on the basis that WP is not a dictionary. HEL 20:49, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Have you looked at evolution and the family of dozens of evolution articles? There is no room for this kind of stuff there. And granted it is not a dictionary, but this is a different kind of material than one would find at a dictionary. I would like to keep the material and disambiguation page material, but I am not sure they can be merged reasonably or if it is against MOS etc.--Filll 21:16, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I've looked. One place where the etymology might fit nicely is in History of evolutionary thought. Still I assert that everything in this article aside from the etymology is better and more comprehensively included on Evolution (disambiguation), and giving an incomplete set of links here is counterproductive, as per KillerChihuahua's argument above. HEL 21:43, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

• Delete - this is acting like a disambig page without actually being a disambig page, and in any case a disambig page already exists. -- Whpq 21:09, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
• Delete See Wiktionary or whatever it's called. This piece of evanescent cloacal effluvium must needs become ejecta. •Jim62sch• 22:53, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
• Comment Actually, while we speak, Silence is turning it into more and more of a real article. So In fact, it will look less and less like a fake diambiguation page and more and more like a real article. Which is great. It is a great destination to offload some of the material we have so heavily built up in the other evolution articles. In fact, this might be a great destinatio for that Nbeale stuff he keeps trying to get into evolution. --Filll 22:59, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
• Keep Definitely do NOT merge. There is no place available in the Evolution article for this much info. Xiner (talk, email) 22:02, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
• strong keep Definitly do not merge, on the basis that the evolution article is already complicated and difficult to edit theough groups inserting POV. The concept of evolution is much broader than biological evolution, and the discussion of its semantics is very much needed. I'm glad we have the article under discussion, and look forward to editing it.DGG 07:56, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
• Delete we've gone through this before with definition of evolution and other Ed Poor historical creations. The reason I support the deletion of such an article is that defining "evolution" is either a task for disambiguation or it is a game meant to promote confusion (especially problematic as a creationist POV-pushing device). For what it's worth, evolution as a "term" doesn't really exist. It is a concept with a very vague definition (change over time). Much of the content of the article is not explanatory or, worse, an original amalgamation of ideas that stray very close to creationist pandering. --ScienceApologist 15:58, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

• "Defining 'evolution' is either a task for disambiguation or it is a game meant to promote confusion"? Um... wrong. Amazingly wrong. Defining "evolution" is the only way to avoid confusion, and is the primary means of preventing it on every site that seeks to avoid ambiguity, including TalkOrigins. It is because creationists commonly leave evolution undefined that it is so difficult to point out the simple error in their usage of the word, and that allows them to easily equivocate between different definitions of "evolution". Any general-use text on evolution, including Wikipedia, must define evolution in order to be meaningful and comprehensible, and the importance and complexity of the term is sufficient to merit an article discussing it (heck, TalkOrigins has spent many pages discussing it, and to enormous benefit for improving clarity and avoiding confusion there), rather than a dab page (dab pages aren't in article-space anyway, and should not be relied on to present highly important information where alternatives are available). Explaining the definitions of evolution in different contexts is not "creationist pandering", and this accusation is not only absurd, but also uncivil and a failure to assume good faith. If the article contents need clarification, then improve them; don't delete an important and noteworthy topic, thus giving the creationists exactly what they want. For someone who is so passionately opposed to creationism, why are you so eager to promote bias and ambiguity in Wikipedia that only helps creationists? It is bizarre. -Silence 18:14, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Look at the associated defining evolution section on creation-evolution controversy. Contrary to what you are saying, creationists spend much of their time trying to "define" away evolution so they can bask in the glory of their arguments. "Macroevolution" vs. "microevolution" in particular is a term creationists love to bandy-about in their definitional and operational soccer games: it leads to such arguments as from whence evolution "philosophically derives" to absurdities like insisting that Christians can only believe in evolution that removed information rather than adds information. This is a creationist exercise, it is under the purview of their gaming. As I see it, defining evolution is a task that really can only be accomplished well through disambiguation, otherwise we will end up with a host of NPOV, verifiability, and reliable source problems, especially considering such points as "word ownership" and "neologisms". --ScienceApologist 16:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Silence, see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ScienceApologist and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience Just H 18:21, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

• Merge into a more centralized evolution article. It seems kind of redundant to have this data separated. Just H 18:21, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Well Just H, it would be great if we could put all information from the 100+ articles about evolution in just one. Unfortunately, it would be unreadable then. It would also be great if we could do the same for the 100+ articles on creationism or any other topic which has many articles associated with it. However, this just is impractical.--Filll 16:48, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

• Keep — It goes further than a dicdef, and that much info wouldn't look right as a disambiguation page. Wizardman 17:27, 15 January 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.