Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Electron internal structure


 * 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 delete. Apart from the creator and two new accounts with likely WP:COI/WP:SOCK issues, everybody thinks this is WP:OR.  Sandstein  06:47, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

Electron internal structure

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No indication of notability, massive NPOV problems and the very existence of the article contradicts scientific consensus on the nature of the electron. I just don't see how to keep this article. MjolnirPants  Tell me all about it.  16:42, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
 * For the record, my preferred course of action is to Redirect and merge to Electron. Some of the material seems worth keeping. MjolnirPants   Tell me all about it.  16:53, 14 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Since the point Theory of the electron is limited to three dimensions and Williamson model is in 16 dimensions, then like String theory it may be compatible. No?
 * On having read Dr. Williamson and Dr. Van Der Marks papers, what precise paragraphs to find objection to? Shurly you not saying that this work contradicts scientific consensus without specific points of contention when the authors seem to promoting this work as being an enlightenment to QED.--Pete.delaney (talk) 18:28, 14 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete or Redirect and Merge Quite clearly. WP:FRINGE, WP:NPOV, WP:GNG. ThePlatypusofDoom (talk) 20:24, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 20:33, 14 August 2016 (“The evolution of the physicist’s picture of nature,” Scientific

American, vol. 208, no. 2, 1963.UTC)
 *  Redirect and marge Delete to Electron per nom. Definitely not mainstream and I can see no prospect of the creator allowing appropriate material to exist on Wikipedia. Xxanthippe (talk) 22:32, 14 August 2016 (UTC).


 * I'm trying to explain the value of this work and it's presentation on Wikipedia. I'd prefer to make a complete presentation in this article, which support from the experts that are developing it. So far I haven't even seen a detailed argument against their work. To be fair I think we owe Dr. Williamson, Dr. Van Der Mark, and Dr. Leary the benefit of the doubt and read their work before throwing stones. In the FRINGE argument I doubt our Universities frequently accept Ph.D. Dissertations on Fringe Theories without any merit. I don't see any thing in Google showing that Universities are giving out PhD. in physics on Fringe dissertations. Are there many/any? Lets gets some professionals in this field agreeing that the University of Glasglow has accepted a PhD dissertation on mere Fringe idea and why they think the ideas are so weird. My reading of their work is that it's a beautiful theory that's deriving things like the electron rest mass and charge from 1st principles.--Pete.delaney (talk) 23:14, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
 * You fail to understand the nature of Wikipedia. It is an encyclopedia of knowledge found in secondary sources. It is not a forum for discussing the validity of new theories WP:No original research. Xxanthippe (talk) 00:22, 15 August 2016 (UTC).
 * Pete, whether we have an article on this or not really has nothing to do with the validity of Williamson's work. He could be completely right, and we could still not have an article on it. Or he could be completely wrong, so wrong as to be ridiculous, and we might still have an article on it (for example; flat earth). Please check out The Five Pillars of Wikipedia, which will help you understand what our mission is here. Also, please read the link Xxanthippe provided. It's extremely important, as well. MjolnirPants   Tell me all about it.  02:04, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Delete per OP.74.70.146.1 (talk) 02:53, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete unless evidence is provided that this new model has gained significant notability within the relevant scientific community. As far as I can tell the references for the new model are conference preprints, personal essays, and one paper in a journal having an impact factor of about 0.4. Not a promising start. Perhaps better citations will be forthcoming, but until then Wikipedia policy requires that the article be deleted. Useful material within the article can, of course, be ported into other articles as appropriate. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 03:04, 15 August 2016 (UTC)


 * The topic of this wikipedia page to to summarize the various theories on the internal structure of the electron. The point charge with a cloud of photons, electrons, and positrons buzzing around the charge is the most common theory. I'd like to present the highlights of this theory more. There are additional theories, for example Dr. Mills work on the Grand Unified Theory of Classical Physics that I'm considering. I thought I'd put the leading theories at the top of the wiki page, and have less promising theories, like Mills, near the end or perhaps not at all. I've discussed Mills theory with a Quantum Mechanic and he wasn't impressed. There are quite a few theories out there, and so far I'm mostly impressed with the Theory proposed by Williamson et.al. Perhaps you guys have some additional theories that we can discuss. Feels to me that it's worth having a wiki page that collects the various theories together, discussing their good and bad attributes. I'm discussing your Notability issue with Williamson et. al. --Pete.delaney (talk) 03:48, 15 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Steven's external was then head of the department of Mathematics at Imperial. He was well-tested! He claims though this was as nothing to the grilling he had had the day before from Martin Van Der Mark. Tested by one of the worlds best physicists and one of the UK's best mathematicians. Must be ok then! --Pete.delaney (talk) 05:45, 15 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Just the paper John and Martin published by the Louis de Broglie foundation in 1991 has received a respectable number of citations (46). Dr. Williamson latest papers are much more rigorous. His citations in other journals they are way ahead of the journal average, even for the most prestigious journals such as Phys Rev Lett. This is how journals gain impact factor: by publishing authors like Dr. Williamson who produce work that gets lots of citations.The present work, however, is way beyond the quality (and eventual impact of those). These are very early days and it is quite normal that revolutionary stuff has difficulty at the beginning. The new theory (beyond the semi-classical model of the 1997 paper) only really came out last year! --Pete.delaney (talk) 06:02, 15 August 2016 (UTC)


 * The new theory has inner complexity beyond current string theories it differs in several crucial ways. Firstly string theories are non-perturbative - which means that one cannot calculate with them to give such things as the electron charge. Further the extra dimensions in string theories are considered hidden, non observable then. Very convenient! Not subject to the scientific method then. These dimension are just added to deal ad-hoc with difficulties as they arise.


 * Our "extra dimensions" are just such things as elementary areas and volumes. They are all derived directly from just the four dimensions of space and time. Secondly the "inner structure" in competing theories is purely mathematical. In ours they are purely dynamical, governed by a set of first order linear differential equations just like Newtons laws, Maxwell's equations (which they contain), or the Dirac equation (to which the present approach is very similar). Quite different kind of beast altogether. This should be said, and linked to!


 * Martin and John are working on several articles at the moment with a view to submitting them to prestigious journals.


 * Wiki should really have some discussion about what is in the electron to give it its quantum spin and extended wave properties in atoms, molecules and the solid state. This is considered to be a hard discussion, but does not mean it should not be out there.--Pete.delaney (talk) 06:12, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Pete, a couple things.
 * First, this much text is not likely to be read by most people. Most people will see it and simply scroll past.
 * Second, if this theory contradicts string theory, and produces predictions similar to it, then it is not a theory of the electron, but a theory of everything. It is, at least, a particle theory.
 * Third, your critiques of string theory here are not entirely accurate. For example, you say string theory is "non-perturbative" because it cannot predict the charge of an electron. This... doesn't make sense. The goal of any theory is to find a non-perturbative definition for one thing (because that would allow precise predictions which can be tested), and for the other thing, there's no 'calculating' the charge of an electron: It's negative. If it were not negative, it would not be an electron. You may mean to say that string theory does not predict the existence of a negatively charged particle with a very tiny mass, but this would be incorrect. As another example, you said that the extra dimensions of string theory are untestable, when in truth, there is no fundamental reason why that would be so. They may, in fact be untestable, but to the best of our current understanding, that would be due to the limits of technology; a fact which which invalidates your criticism.
 * Finally, the mainstream consensus is that there is no internal structure to the electron. The reasons for this can be rather complex in detail, but can be summed up by pointing out that there's only one kind of electron, hence there's no reason to suspect an internal structure. Atomic nuclei come in different forms, hence why we have searched for (and found) an internal structure of the nucleus.
 * This is why I suggested we merge this page to electron. I see no way to give adequate coverage of the mainstream consensus view of the electron's structure in that article with the weight it deserves. How much text can one devote to saying "there is none"? Not much. You might be able to work a 30-word sentence out of that, at best. It's just not feasible to have an article on this. Now, one could have a subsection in our electron article titled "Theories about a possible internal structure of the electron" under the "Characteristics" section that could contain a brief overview of this work. But again, it would need to be brief, and it would need to emphasize the mainstream view. MjolnirPants   Tell me all about it.  13:44, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
 * In just a few sentences, what is the internal structure of an electron according to string theory?
 * I was mostly quoting Dr. Williamson, let me ask him and get back to you on that.
 * The page on an electron says that but it seems to me that a point is an internal structure, thought very very simple. I thought Dirac claims it is a point, not just that he assumed it was a point. I thought this point assumption was part of the need for re-normalization. No. Want to clarify? --Pete.delaney (talk) 02:31, 16 August 2016 (UTC) (signature added by )
 * Pete, this is now the third time I've told you that you may not edit other user's comments. You must stop this, you can be sanctioned for not respecting other editor's messages. You not only inserted your responses inside my last comment, you erased part of 's comment. I've explained to your how to quote another user to respond point by point; you need to do that instead of editing someone else's comment. Now, as to your questions, you also need to know that this page is not for discussing the differences between Williamson's theory and string theory or the standard model. It is for discussing what we should do with the page in question. That being said, I will give you a brief answer: A structure is, by definition in both physics and common usage, an arrangement of different parts. In string theory, electrons have no structure, because they are composed of a single one-dimensional, vibrating string. In the standard model, they are composed of one single, infinitely small zero-dimensional point. Neither of those two descriptions is a 'structure'. They are fundamental objects. Now, we need to return to the topic of what to do with this page. I believe I've given my thoughts on that already. If you don't have anything to add (about what to do with the page), then I suggest we let this thread die. MjolnirPants   Tell me all about it.  05:30, 16 August 2016 (UTC)


 * delete per WP:TNT - this is a work of WP:OR. I suggest the creator check out WP:EXPERT, especially the 2nd bullet in the advice for expert editors section.  Writing an encyclopedia is very, very different from writing a review article  or anything else that academics usually do.   We generate content by summarize existing reviews created by experts in the field and that get published in the literature - we don't create reviews ourselves by summarizing the primary literature here in WP.  We should not ever cite a PhD thesis which by definition has to break new ground. Jytdog (talk) 06:46, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
 * If this article was review or summary of different theories postulating inner structure of electron (string theory, preons etc.) it could work but at present state it simply advocates one theory. Also in that case caveats of each theory should be mentioned alongside with good sides. When it comes to user MjolnirPants claim that there is no consensus on electron structure – that is certainly true – but one has to keep on mind that were talking about theoretical physics. The other previously mentioned issue is notability of this theory. Hypothesis/theories such as string theory, loop quantum  theory  have been thought by multiple authors and been referenced in others works. As an analogy it resembles corporations creating articles about their own products in advertorial manner.--Fisuaq (talk) 18:02, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
 * That was my thinking also, and I proposed this morning to the group that the wiki page focus a lot more on the primarily accepted theory that the charge in electron is confined to a point and the tricks that Feynman et. al. had to make to deal with the divergences. I also thought the other theories of the internal structure of an electron should be presented. There are many theories on the internal structure of an electron, and it's likely difficult as the electron structure likely must exist more than three dimensions to accomplish the 720 degree spin. Also the measurements of spin seem to be unusual. requiring the Clifford Algebra that classical QED and Robinson et. al. are using as the foundation of this work. I got a copy of Stephen Leary PhD thesis today and hope to find some references in his work and understand Clifford Algebra better to better present both the Classical QED (or Quantum Field Theory) perspective as will as the rather enticing model that John, Martin, and Stephen have been developing.  I agree that the purpose of Wikipedia is enlightenment and don't want to lead anyone away from the truth. I'm going to browse Stephan's work some and wait to see what the rest of the group thinks on broadening the presentation to include both the establish point model as well as other models that I've been reading about. The area seems large enough to warrant a wiki page with a summary on and reference on the 'Electon' page as well as other that refer to the point charge model. These models for QED have almost 100 years of development and it takes a while to understand them. I'll update this discussion once I hear from the guys in England this evening. --Pete.delaney (talk) 00:10, 16 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete --- There are a number of peer-reviewed published theories have proposed internal structure of the electron (most of them ruled out by data). An article that details that history would certainly be valuable but, as written, this page is obtuse and incomprehensible with occasional real science quotes and vocabulary sprinkled in to make it sound plausible. The page is definitely written to promote a particular view and it does so incoherently. Jason Quinn (talk) 14:51, 18 August 2016 (UTC)


 * I've been thinking of how to extend this further to include more electron models and to present the material in a more coherent format. If you have some proposed theories that you know of that haven't been ruled out by data and I don't include them I'd appreciate hearing from you on what they are. Dr. Williamson assures me that their theory has not been ruled out by data.--Pete.delaney (talk) 09:59, 20 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Dr. Williamson's and Dr. Van Der Mark's 1st paper "Is the electron a photon with toroidal topology?" has  in fact cited 46 times (including self-references), see: --Pete.delaney (talk) 12:05, 20 August 2016 (UTC)
 * That's not a lot of cites, really. (GS says that 33 of my papers have been cited at least 46 times and I'm a nobody.) Given the consequences this idea would have if it were accepted -- it might even be Nobel-worthy -- 46 cites is very little attention. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 13:38, 20 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep --- I am a software engineer and studying Dirac/Clifford Algebra and I think that Williamson's group work on the  internals of the electron has plenty of citations and is worthy of keeping --Arradis (talk) 20:53, 20 August 2016 (UTC) — Arradis (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.


 * Dr. Williamson's 2014 paper comes up with 10 citations on Google Scholar.--Pete.delaney (talk) 07:15, 21 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Dr. Williamson's latest paper "On the nature of the photon and the electron" already comes up with three citations, but one is by John and the other by Martin, so I suppose it's only fair to count the one article by Atkins, Gauther et. al. but even that paper was contributed to by Martin and John. --Pete.delaney (talk) 07:15, 21 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep --- I am a scientist with a Ph.D. in theoretical astrophysics, and have published work, such as at http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/508708, which involves atomic and molecular physics. A suitable understanding of the internal structure of the electron is critical to our understanding of the role the weak nuclear force plays in the early universe, and why the universe is dominated by matter, rather than equal amounts of matter and antimatter.--Niedergeislbach (talk) 02:06, 22 August 2016 (UTC) — Niedergeislbach (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.


 * 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.