Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Common misunderstandings of genetics

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 keep. Stifle (talk) 11:04, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Common misunderstandings of genetics

Common misunderstandings of genetics (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

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Title is inherently OR. How common is common? There is no clear criterion for what's a "common misconception" besides "source x says it's common", which is really stretching it. List is inherently WP:SYNTH. See related rationale and discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of common misconceptions (3rd nomination). Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • ^{(Otters want attention)} 12:57, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

keep This article was created in 2007 with a lot of work in collaboration from editors with significantly different viewpoints. It is carefully refed and has quite substantial content. Who cares "how common is common" - if a WP:RS or better more than one indicates that it's common then it's common enough. We should also use common sense. (PS I find that I was the original creator of the article, though others did a lot more work on it) NBeale (talk) 13:41, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• Delete and move material to various articles. The problem is that the selection of misconceptions for inclusion in the article (I'm sure there are many more which could have been included, but were not) requires evaluation beyond what WP editors are supposed to apply to the subject. If there is some some generally held list of misconceptions, discussed among e.g. historians of science and generally accepted, then that might be the basis for such an article. Otherwise this material needs to be moved to various other articles as parenthetical clarification at appropriate points. The material does seem valuable so I suggest you copy it to your userspace before the article is deleted, as I think it will be. EEng (talk) 15:55, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
• Keep. I would have thought it common knowledge, rather than common errors, that we determine what is common--as with other subjective criteria applied by wikipedia--by applying common sense.--Epeefleche (talk) 17:25, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Your parallel between common knowledge and common misconception is a false one, because common means different things in those two phrases.

In the phrase common knowledge the word common means "held in common" i.e. essentially universal, so that "it is common knowledge that New York City is in the United States" means that essentially everyone knows it. Whether or not a given piece of information should be treated as common (i.e. universal) knowledge is something editors can usually determine by consensus.

But in the phrase common misconceptions, the word common means frequently found. (In fact, here it really can't mean "almost universal," because certainly there are many people who are not confused about whatever it is.) Thus there's no analogy between common knowledge and common misconception -- we'll need outside sources -- several in substantial agreement -- to tell us which of the many misconceptions are the common ones. And I doubt we'll find that because, Stephen Jay Gould and a few others aside, it's not something to which very much careful attention is given.

EEng (talk) 18:04, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Apologies for not closing with a smiley face.  ;) --Epeefleche (talk) 06:13, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

• Keep and rename, if need be—The topic of misunderstanding evolution is widely documented and notable.—RJH (talk) 17:27, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Genetics and evolution are quite different, though related, things. And the need for RS for what the "common misconceptions" are is still there. EEng (talk) 18:04, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

My statement applies to genetics as well. Try searching for misunderstandings genetics on Google books.—RJH (talk) 16:17, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

• Merge with List of common misconceptions. I wouldn't object to this page existing except that it's fairly small and only contains four real examples, one of which ("Genes as words") is arguably "common" at all. Give genetics a section on the main misconceptions page instead. ShadowUltra (talk) 17:57, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

All my comments above apply to the general common misconceptions article, as amply demonstrated by its talk page [1]. EEng (talk) 18:04, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 2 February 2011 (UTC)
• Keep writing articles always requires judgement about what to include--it is not a mechanical process. We always decide in writing an article what of the available evidence to use, and which of the objections to mention, and how to answer them. This is no different. similar objections have been raised about "Criticism of ..." articles, but even if we included the content in the main article, we would still have to be selective and judge what is important enough to include. This particular article needs some further improvements, however: the way things are stated are in fact too judgmental. DGG ( talk ) 19:26, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
• Keep The article is well-sourced. I'm not sure I understand the nomination's rationale. The nom says "'source x says it's common' is really stretching it". Actually, that's exactly how our WP:V policy works. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:52, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
• Keep: Well-sourced and notable - Ret.Prof (talk) 03:22, 7 February 2011 (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.