Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/George Finlayson


 * 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. Non-admin closure. Roscelese (talk &sdot; contribs) 17:02, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

George Finlayson

 * – ( View AfD View log )

Speedy declined. Article makes no assertion of notability. As a screening check, Google Scholar shows only a very few citations to the book that he wrote. Google Books shows the one book and no commentary on it, nor biography of the author. Wtshymanski (talk) 16:59, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment The one book that is cited is a "standard work of reference on notable figures from British history", the Dictionary of National Biography. Finlayson also had a similar entry in the American Cyclopaedia. In truth, I'm not immediately seeing what it was that granted him that degree of attention, but it does seem to be evidence that he was considered notable in the 19th century. AllyD (talk) 18:25, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Clarification - I should have said that he (Finlayson) only wrote one book, which has only a few citations showing on Scholar. I wasn't referring to the Dictionary of National Biography. --Wtshymanski (talk) 18:35, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Scotland-related deletion discussions.  —AllyD (talk) 18:53, 17 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep I've added a few references and links to the article itself. In addtion, I note that his book was utilised by one Charles Darwin ("The Correspondence of Charles Darwin: Volume 2, 1837-1843" ISBN 9780521255882). I feel there is enough to merit the article. AllyD (talk) 19:02, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 00:49, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 00:50, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

I did a small amount of investigation before nominating (see above) and evidently didn't get the sacred acceptable results. But please feel free to abuse me more. Not every dead British Army surgeon needs a Wikipedia article. The text was exceptionally uninformative, and copy'n'paste from copyright-expired sources is a hallmark of worthless articles. --Wtshymanski (talk) 16:33, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. I don't know how the nominator missed all the relevant info that a basic GoogleBooks search provides here. The Crawfurd mission was the first European mission to Siam and Finlayson's account of it received significant attention at the time it was published and thereafter. Here are a couple of examples of in-depth and detailed reviews of the book, also containing significant biographical coverage of Finlayson himself, from 1820s:, . There are also quite a few examples of modern coverage, such as this one. To quote from the last source:"Finlayson was one of the best naturalists of his day and his studies in southern Thailand and the Malay peninsula were pioneering". He did not make the Dictionary of the Natural Biography for nothing. Nsk92 (talk) 01:12, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep on basis of arguments above. Nominator is advised to carry out WP:Before more thoroughly before making further nominations in this area. Xxanthippe (talk) 01:53, 18 May 2011 (UTC).
 * Comment by nominator - none of this showed up when I looked at Google Books. It will be wonderful to have all these notable references added to the article. --Wtshymanski (talk) 01:59, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * speedy keep - Even I wouldn't have nom'd this for CSD or AFD. Notable enough to have a bird named after him! - UtherSRG (talk) 02:05, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment. The nominator could consider withdrawing the nomination to reduce the backlog by one. Xxanthippe (talk) 02:26, 18 May 2011 (UTC).
 * Comment by nom - Is having a bird named after you enough to pass the WP:PROF test? I suppose that could be considered to pass the first criterion; he certainly doesn't pass 2 through 9. I looked at one of the book review references and the reviewer spends most of his time recounting how Finlayson doesn't like Orientals; I suppose race science is science, of a kind. --Wtshymanski (talk) 02:35, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep - I have a low tolerance for attempts to knock serious material out of the encyclopedia on sourcing grounds. If there is insufficient sourcing showing on an article about an early 19th Century Scottish naturalist, then tag it for more sources!!! Yet again and again we see people dragging serious work to the slaughterhouse because it doesn't measure to some guideline delivered from a burning bush to Moses 5000 years ago... Sheesh. Terrible nomination. He's listed in the OXFORD DICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY. Maybe that's a clue? Here's an 1889 DICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY. Shit, nominator, for the love of Sweet Baby Jesus: WP:BEFORE. I am out of here... Carrite (talk) 05:05, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment by nominator - you can get listed in some dictionary of biography for having had an ancestor that held the King's horses. Excuse me if I'm not exhaustively familiar with the notability of 19th century naturalists. Too bad all these vital facts weren't in the article last week. Once again AfD turns into an impromptu article improvement drive. Perhaps I did my Google Books and Google Scholar searches incorrectly, I don't recall seeing a lot of unique items show up. --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:26, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I notice the flanking divines and sea captains don't have Wikipedia articles either, so showing up in a dictionary of national biography is not an infalliable passport to a Wikipedia article. Or are you going to swear at me about those, too? --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:13, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * That's irrelevant. I would point out that the article, when nominated, explicitly noted that the material was from the Dictionary of National Biography, and even provided a link to the our wikipedia article which tells us that it "is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history".  That should be ample clue that this was a notable person, and tagging it for improvement would have been far more appropriate. -- Whpq (talk) 17:13, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's irrelevant; our criteria for articles about scientists and other academics are not the same as the criteria for being listed in a book of British biographies. Our criteria say something about "multiple, independant, significant" sources; after all, my name is in 300,000 books but that doesn't make me notable. And why doesn't the worthy cleric have an article here, if that's the relevant criterion? He gets about 5 times the space Finlayson got; I'm sure the bigraphical dictionary cited has hundreds of other entries on people who are too obscure for Wikipedia articles. Cutting and pasting a biography from some copyright-expired source is not a strong way to build this encyclopedia. Tgging for improvement is most often pointless since they seem to have no effect. It's not hard to find stale tags that have sat on articles for years. --Wtshymanski (talk) 18:03, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The fact that nobody has expended the effort to create an article about a person does not mean that the person is not notable. The fact that there aren't enough editors to improve all the articles we have is no reason to delete them.  If you feel that stale tags need to be dealt with, then I implore you to join one the many wikiprojects devoted to cleanup. -- Whpq (talk) 19:20, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I've been doing stale tags all week. We've got 3+ million articles and we still don't have an article on everyone in the 19th century dictionary of biography (nor, for that matter, everyone in the 1948 Bakersfield California phone book). We've got several hundred thousand editors. If this elite group has chosen to focus more on Pokemons and grage bands than obscure entries from 19th century directories, then perhaps the 19th century directories aren't a good guide to notability. --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:33, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. Anyone who has an article in the DNB is most certainly notable. The notability thresholds for that work are far higher than for Wikipedia. It's the standard academic reference work on notable people in British history, for crying out loud. It is most certainly not "some copyright-expired source", but an ongoing project used and contributed to by scholars throughout the world. Yet another AfD nomination that seems to be based on the highly flawed premise that if a subject doesn't show up numerous times on the internet then it's not notable. How many times do we have to say that the internet is not the one and only criterion for inclusion before it sinks in? Time and time again we hear the cry "it's not on Google Books so it's not notable". Utter and absolute rubbish! -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:44, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * More from the poor devil who had the gall to nominate an article for deletion It's too bad all this notability wasn't apparent from the cut'n'paste form that the article had initially. Perhaps we shouldn't cut'n'paste from copyright-expired sources just to pad the article count but instead should actually explain the relevance of any given entry to *this* project. Finlayson's whole reputation rests on ONE (posthumously published) book? What sort of academic has only ONE publication? Ordinarily, that wouldn't get you into Wikipedia - but I guess things are different if you're listed in the British dictionary of biography. Forgive me for not being able to recognize sacred articles from the common run of filler. --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:15, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Please note that this man lived in the early 19th century, when books were much rarer, not in the 21st century, when everyone and his wife writes them. Reputations were frequently made with a single book in those days. He was also well-travelled in an age when travel in exotic parts frequently did make one notable. You cannot apply the same standards of notability to historic figures as you do to modern figures. Now everyone travels and writes books - then they didn't. Which is why he was included in the DNB - his modern equivalents almost certainly wouldn't be. No, the article shouldn't have been simply cut-and-pasted, which is never a good idea, but in all fairness you did nominate it for deletion only three days after it was created. Wait a little longer and maybe it would have been expanded. And as has already been pointed out, AfD is not a good forum for highlighting poorly-sourced or poorly-written articles. As long as the subject appears to have notability, these should be tagged for cleanup, not deletion. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:40, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Further comment from an emittered nominator Yes, this is why we have "articles" about teenage girls who died in a convent in the 12th century, who are considered "notable" because their aunt was the Queen of Jerusalem or some such trivial linkage. This is why we have "articles" about random spare electronic parts, and random dots on astronomical photographs. This is why we have "articles" that are lists of imaginary vehicles, weapons, people, etc. I thought notability wasn't temporary? I think it would be more honest if we admitted that "notability" is not as important as "partisanship", or at least only a rough guide...you can get anything into an article in Wikipedia if you can motivate a tiny group in favor of it. Is it *too* much to ask for someone cut'n'pasting a listing of his favorite obscure 19th century personalities to at least *try* to show why the listing shouldn't be deleted instantly as craven plagiarism? You learn in the 5th grade not to copy someone else's words as pass them off as yours; or you should.  --Wtshymanski (talk) 14:10, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * That's an issue for the original author. But the fact remains that a DNB entry is generally held to be a sign of notability and that Finlayson is probably a damn sight more notable than many of the transient minor modern "celebrities" who have long and detailed articles written by dribbling fanboys and girls who will doubtless have forgotten all about them in a couple of years! -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:17, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * But 200-year-old fanboyism is somehow different? That's why hundreds of entries in the DNB have never gotten entries in the Wikipedia. Who knows how long the legacy of Charlie Sheen will last? DNB wasn't compiled as a gift to scholars yet unborn, it was to track the celebrities of the day! That's why our criterion is multiple independent significant sources, not who's-who directories. Getting listed in DNB doesn't seem to be one of the criteria in WP:PROF. (The succeeding entry in DNB is more than 4 times the length of this one, but unless some 21st century fanboy decides otherwise, James Finlayson DD (1758-1808) is never getting an article, even though he published 3 books!)--Wtshymanski (talk) 14:54, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The DNB is written by academics and experts, not fanboys. It's a scholarly publication, not a vanity exercise like many directories. The reason many people in the DNB have not yet got Wikipedia articles is because nobody has yet got around to writing them, not because they don't deserve them. It has also only ever contained biographies of people who were dead before their biographies were written and who were considered notable by experts in their field, not living "celebrities". Finlayson's article (by J. M. Rigg, himself a respected historian and literary scholar with his own entry in the DNB) was written at least 62 years after his death, for instance! It was indeed "compiled as a gift to scholars yet unborn" (and scholars of the day). That is exactly what it was for and is exactly what it continues to be for. I really wish you'd get your facts straight before making comments as by making claims like this you are only showing yourself to be ignorant of the source material. Stop confusing respected academic works with vanity and fan publications. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:06, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Seems a little circular to me- a directory entry is notable because it's written by someone else in that directory? Significance of a scientists's work would be show by other citations in the field, not a general biographical reference book. The cut'n'pasted material didn't visibly make any claims of notability for the subject (it wasn't even edited enough to take out the bibliogabble "8vo" at tne end of the book title!).
 * Sure I'm ignorant of the subject. So's our reader! And if I can't figure out why some random dead white male is in the encyclopedia, why should our reader be compelled to search the archives of academic fandom seeking an explanation for the presence of this individual in the encyclopedia? I thought the mission of Wikipedia was to share the world's knowledge, not just to look down our virtual noses and say "you poor ignorant slob, how could you not know that a mention in some 19th century biographical dictionary is equivalent to both a Nobel Prize and a daytime Emmy in 21st century terms".
 * Not only did we steal someone else's copyright-expired words, we didn't even steal good words! Rigg did a lamentably poor job of explaining Finlayson's significance to the world and context. We should be able to do better. But I'm getting pilloried for pointing this out. --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:42, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * No. You are "getting pilloried" for nominating an article for deletion when a small amount of investigation would have shown it to be notable, and the rest of the issues are all ones of cleanup which do not require the article to deleted.  -- Whpq (talk) 16:20, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Really? Like worthless articles from the 1911 Encyclopedia Brittanica?  - Whpq (talk) 16:57, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Good grief. You clearly have no understanding of sources for British history if you continue to claim the DNB is a "directory". It's a dictionary. They are not the same thing. Just accept that the DNB is a reputable and respected source and not the vanity list of celebrities you seem to think it is. We don't expect our readers to know about a subject before they read about it. We do, however, expect our editors to do a little research and have a little understanding of the subject before they nominate articles for deletion. As for being a circular argument, you appear to be saying that an historian notable enough in his own right to receive a DNB entry after his own death shouldn't be writing articles about other people. What?! Should we discount biographical works written by people if they themselves become subjects of biographical works after their own deaths? This is a bizarre argument. You seem to be getting angry because your proposed deletion is being opposed by people who know more about historical sources than you do. This is just ridiculous. Mind you, since one of your edit summaries here was "There's at least 1,000,000 too many articles anyway...", I think we know what your attitude to Wikipedia is. -- Necrothesp (talk) 17:21, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * You know, nominating an article for deletion shouldn't be like poking a wasp's nest. The original text was ineffective. If it had looked *then* like it looks *now* I wouldn't have nominated. And yes, if something was cut'n'pasted from the 1911 Britannica, I'd consider that at least plagiarism and at best a very dubious beginning to an article. I guess I'm not ignoring the differences between the Five Pillars as preached, and what actually gets practiced. --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:00, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The whole point is that this is where you list articles for deletion because their subjects are non-notable, not for cleanup because they're badly written. I agree that cutting and pasting is a very poor idea and that the article as written when you nominated it was very poor, but that's not what AfD is for. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:30, 21 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep It has always accepted that having a full article in the DNB is notable. Articles here on these  people are our core material. WP is based on sourcing, and the importance of this particular source is widely acknowledged.  DGG ( talk ) 20:37, 22 May 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.