Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gundlach's Law


 * 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. It's possible that such a law may exist and apply to some local email lists or discussion groups but without sources or significant coverage, there's no way to verify it. Please see verifiability, not truth. Ron Ritzman (talk) 00:20, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Gundlach's Law

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I have rather doubtfully declined a blatant-hoax speedy on this and bring it here to give its author time to defend it if he can. Sources provided do not mention either Gundlach or his Law, and searches find nothing relevant. If not a hoax, there is no evidence that this is more than something made up one day. Fails WP:Verifiability, WP:Notability and WP:NEO. JohnCD (talk) 21:18, 30 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if I am executing my response properly. I did not see anywhere to add a comment so I am editing the exiting comment to add mine.  No slight is intended by this action.


 * The charge is that this page is a hoax. As the author, I would like to know the basis of the charge.


 * This page makes two assertions: First, it provides an axiom that, as discussion continues, the likelihood that the subject of zombies will be interjected, increases. Second, it credits a person named David Gundlach with the formulation of that axiom.


 * The first is pratically tautological. The second can only be disproven by evidence that someone else has already made this observation or that David Gundlach either does not exist or did not make the observation. As the article is modeled on Godwin's Law, I would note that the citations on that page are basically blog entries which, according to my reading of the guidelines, is not sufficient.  Are you suggesting that this article would be satisfactory if Mr. Gundlach created a blog entry expounding his principle?


 * Is the objection based on the subject matter? If so, there are literally dozens of Wikipedia entries regarding zombies - several cited in this page - that should also be deleted.


 * Zombie references are pervasive in our society. Paul Krugman, the Nobel Laureate often refers to "Zombie Economics" as shorthand for economic beliefs that have been disproven but still persist. I also cited zombie references in a published academic paper and on the US CDC web site. A google search on the word "zombie" returns 18,400,000 pages of results. Surely, this attests to the truth of Gundlach's Law. (By comparison, google "nazi" and you will receive only 7,780,000 pages of results. By that measure, if Gundlach's Law is a hoax, Godwin's Law is even more so.)


 * I respectfully, but passionately, submit that the charge that Gundlach's Law is a hoax is baseless and capricious. I invite my accuser to contest any point I have made here or in the post.


 * I have also made a good faith offer to edit the page and remove any objectionable material.


 * Thank you for your considerationBcrousseau (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:35, 30 June 2011 (UTC). — BBcrousseau (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.


 * Bcrousseau, the point of the nomination for deletion is not that it is a hoax, but that there is inadequate sourcing which is the responsibility of the author. Please provide adequate sources. Kilmer-san (talk) 21:42, 30 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Reply by nominator: the page was originally proposed for speedy deletion as a hoax, but as I told you on your talk page I declined that nomination and brought it here instead, proposing deletion on different grounds.


 * I also put on your talk page extracts from the relevant policies, the most important being WP:Verifiability: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material in Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true." The essence of your article is that David Gundlach has coined the law stated. Where is a reliable published source to confirm that?


 * Even if you produce a published statement by Gundlach, the WP:Notability standard requires more: you need to show significant coverage in reliable, independent secondary sources - evidence that people independent of Gundlach have found his law important enough to write comment about. JohnCD (talk) 21:51, 30 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment As the article refers to Mr Gundlach as "an obscure data specialist in the United States", I think it quite possible that these sources - outside self-published, blogs or forums - may prove elusive. Peridon (talk) 22:19, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * SNOW Delete More like Gundlach's Original Research. There are absolutely no independent sources that discuss this idea.  Much like a zombie, this article shouldn't have been brought back from the dead in the first place. I, Jethrobot drop me a line 23:44, 30 June 2011 (UTC)


 * STRONG DELETE I've recommended this article for immediate deletion as Nonsense, and as a hoax, and I am quite frankly in shock that this article can remain alive for this long. Even with good faith... I mean "zombies" for crying out loud. But why should we let the truth get in the way of wikipedia articles.... /sarcasm CanadianLinuxUser (talk) 01:28, 1 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Not sure if I am posting in right spot. I am defending this article.


 * This article is mainly pointing out the use of Euphemisms in language. Euphemisms in language are well documented over and over again, and it seems that the English language used by Americans has the highest rate of this. It seems that after every major award show or from a high rated television series new words are used as euphemisms.  This happens on a yearly basis.  Example just a few years ago “Battlestar Gallatica” used “Frack” in use of a four letter word. Our local high school had to have a board meeting and a whole school public awareness to ban the made up word “Frack”.


 * Gundlach’s observation is that Zombies and its many synonyms are being interjected into everyday speech at a rising rate. This was not unnoticed by the CDC(Center for Disease Control) as they also used this in their text to help gain attention for their (Emergency Preparedness and Response) public announcements.  People use these terms to describe tiredness, lack of brightness, drunkenness, among other reasons.  These terms are used on a daily basis.   “People at that company follow orders like they are Zombies.” Or “The baby cried all night, I didn’t get any sleep; I am like the walking dead today.” These have become common place in our language.  Gundlach obviously chose “Zombies” for a specific reason.  He knew using his keen intellect that this would draw attention to this form of doublespeak. He also knows that this very idea of so many euphemisms can change History.  How can you teach History when the words that you are reading mean something different than they were originally intended?


 * So as far as documentation goes you can see this has been covered many times over. And further research or verifiability would only take as much as typing in “euphemisms” into say (Google search, Yahoo search, or Wikipedia itself) 63.163.76.146 (talk) 15:26, 1 July 2011 (UTC)JRS
 * Yes, you can get lots of hits about "euphemism", and we already have an article Euphemism, and similarly an article about Zombie. What this article is about is a supposed "Law" announced by someone called "Gundlach", and I just Googled "Gundlach's Law" and got exactly three hits derived from this article and three which were irrelevant. No one has produced any references to confirm that such a "Law" has been published in any reliable source, or that anyone else has commented about it or discussed it. Read WP:Original research: "If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article about it. If you discover something new, Wikipedia is not the place to premiere such a discovery." JohnCD (talk) 16:36, 1 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete Obvious. Lack of sources. Blatant Rubbish. Dingo1729 (talk) 19:03, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete --unencyclopedic and unreferenced. Had a good laugh, though. --Pgallert (talk) 23:00, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
 * '''Sorry JohnCD, I understood that the post had been moved to a different process but did not realize that it was no longer being considered a hoax.


 * As I understand the current objection, while the validity of Gundlach’s Law is accepted in concept, the term has not gained sufficient currency to qualify for posting on wikipedia. In other words, there are two remaining objections: the question of David Gundlach’s existence and the lack of citations for Gundlach’s Law by reliable sources.


 * Addressing the second point first. I, too, am unable to find another reliable source.  The reason I posted was that I often use Wikipedia to look up terms I see on the internet that are unfamiliar to me.  I envisioned the same scenario for people encountering Gundlach’s Law for the first time.


 * As far as the second, I think we need to seriously consider the implications. This is basically saying that, unless you’re some hot shot lawyer with the IFF or the cofounder of a corporation, you are unworthy of coining a new “law.”  Perhaps I am deluding myself but my conception of the web – and wikipedia, in particular – is much more egalitarian than that.  Warhol’s 15 minutes of fame, not withstanding, most of us live our lives in relative obscurity.  Would you argue that personal notoriety should trump originality or imagination?


 * Today, we see a world where the concentration of wealth and power and the attendant repression of the individual continues unabated. The Internet, even now under attack by those who seek to control it, is perhaps our last, best hope to preserve unrestricted, uncensored exchange of ideas and Wikipedia is one of the leading vessels of that hope.  I understand the need for standards and I am not for a second suggesting that the deletion of Gundlach’s Law for failure to conform precisely to those standards would constitute censorship.


 * But the guidelines themselves note that it is sometimes appropriate to make exceptions. Will it benefit Wikipedia to make a statement that ideas are welcome based on their originality and creativity rather than the prestige of the person that gives them voice?


 * I say yes.


 * With that, I will await your decision. I do not intend to belabor this or post again unless a new objection or question is raised.  Whatever your decision, I appreciate the opportunity to defend the post and I applaud your open-mindedness in saving the post from speedy deletion.Bcrousseau (talk) 14:20, 2 July 2011 (UTC) — BBcrousseau (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Reply: you have not quite understood. It is not suggested that we delete this because Gundlach is "not famous enough" to propose a law: the question is not about him but about his "law", whether there are reliable sources to show that other people have found it interesting and important enough to comment about.


 * The internet is certainly a place for promulgating new ideas, but that is explicitly not Wikipedia's role: an encyclopedia is not a place for first publication. A fundamental policy is no original research, and a key statement in that policy (at the foot of the early paragraph "Using sources") is: "If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article about it. If you discover something new, Wikipedia is not the place to premiere such a discovery."


 * When Mike Godwin first proposed Godwin's Law, it would not have qualified for a Wikipedia article; but over time, as the references to that article show, it has been the subject of independent comment and discussion, so now it does. But notice that Godwin proposed it in 1990, and it did not have an article until 2001. JohnCD (talk) 14:56, 2 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete - C'mon. Kilmer-san (talk) 00:31, 3 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete - it  could be a notable hoax. But  whether it's a hoax or not, it's not  notable by  Wikipedia criteria and policies for hoaxes.  Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 12:53, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per above; also fails WP:FRINGE and WP:NEO. Bearian (talk) 19:20, 5 July 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.