Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ideological Turing test


 * 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. The disagreement here is about whether the sources cited by Omegatron are sufficient to support an article in the light of our applicable rules such as WP:GNG. This is a matter of editorial judgment and not something that I can decide by fiat. But I can determine that a sufficiently strong majority of experienced editors think that the sources are insufficient to establish rough consensus for deletion. The three sentences that make up the article can be undeleted (please ask another admin) for a merger to Bryan Caplan, if that is desired.  Sandstein  07:13, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

Ideological Turing test

 * – ( View AfD View log )

This has been a redirect since 2017 due to lack of support in reliable independent sources. It's recently been reinstated, but the sources were terrible. Most of it was drawn from the inventor himself, Bryan Caplan, on his blog, or material published on the Liberty Fund's websites (Caplan is associated with them). The substantive content was blog posts (including Patheos and Wordpress blogs). What remains after the obviously unreliable are removed, is a couple of namechecks - and that is exactly representative of the level of traction this idea actually has. While Caplan has been assiduously promoted and his opinion (usually primary-sourced) added to large numbers of Wikipedia articles, he is not, in fact, a significant thought leader in economics, he's just a garden variety libertarian think-tanker.

I do not think that this term, with its 139 unique Google hits, is an independently notable subject, and I do not think that adding any number of namechecks and affiliated primary sources can fix that. As a purported term of art in economics, the academic literature is the indicator of whether this is taken seriously. As far as I can tell, it is not. All I can find in remotely serious economic sites is self-published materials and the occasional essay. Guy (help! - typo?) 19:11, 17 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Keep - Has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. — Omegatron (talk) 21:12, 17 April 2021 (UTC)
 * You're welcome to add these, but Wordpress, Typepad, Patheos, Econlog, The Volokh Conspiracy, Medium and LessWrong are nto reliable sources so please don't reintroduce those. Guy (help! - typo?) 23:30, 17 April 2021 (UTC)
 * : Yes, they are reliable sources (for the facts they reference), as are the books and academic papers that discuss the topic (for both facts and notability). Please stop blanking the article during the AfD. — Omegatron (talk) 23:50, 17 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Some examples:
 * Significant coverage: Yes, a section of a book
 * Reliable source: Yes, published book
 * Secondary source: Yes
 * Independent of the subject: Yes
 * Significant coverage: Yes, a chapter of a book
 * Reliable source: Yes, published book
 * Secondary source: Yes
 * Independent of the subject: Yes
 * Significant coverage: Yes, a section of a paper
 * Reliable source: Yes, academic journal
 * Secondary source: Yes
 * Independent of the subject: Yes
 * Significant coverage: Yes, an article about the topic
 * Reliable source: Yes, magazine with editorial process
 * Secondary source: Yes
 * Independent of the subject: Yes
 * Significant coverage: Yes, describes an instance of "Type 3" ITT, more than a trivial mention
 * Reliable source: Yes, magazine with editorial process
 * Secondary source: Yes
 * Independent of the subject: Yes
 * ... — Omegatron (talk) 00:07, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Nothing can turn self-published primary sources into RS for the notability of a term that would, if it were notable, be discussed in the economic literature. You should know this. We routinely delete crazy ideas that are only poropounded and refuted on blogs. This is by design. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:24, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The Vox article is a trivial mention. Jlevi (talk) 13:23, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * And the "Discover Magazine" item is a blog post, not a magazine story that actually passed through an editorial process. It's a pretty trivial blog post at that, too, in the "hey, this happened" genre. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 17:32, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The Philosophy and Phenomenological Research item is a short section, only three brief paragraphs, that gives a bare description of the idea and does not discuss its history, shortcomings, use in actual practice, or anything else that I'd expect from an in-depth discussion. (Other sections of the paper actually discuss empirical evidence, compare different thinkers, etc. The bit about the "political Turing test" might be the most insubstantial part of the paper.) It's coverage, but I can't honestly call it WP:SIGCOV. And of all the sources that have turned up so far, that's the one which probably went through the highest standard of review. Really, there's less and less here the more I look at it. Caplan works at Cato, so the Kling book is out. The only source in the list above that is independent, reliable, and close to substantial is the section in Galef's book (it's not a whole chapter). And one source isn't enough for wiki-notability. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 15:19, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * ... — Omegatron (talk) 00:07, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Nothing can turn self-published primary sources into RS for the notability of a term that would, if it were notable, be discussed in the economic literature. You should know this. We routinely delete crazy ideas that are only poropounded and refuted on blogs. This is by design. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:24, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The Vox article is a trivial mention. Jlevi (talk) 13:23, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * And the "Discover Magazine" item is a blog post, not a magazine story that actually passed through an editorial process. It's a pretty trivial blog post at that, too, in the "hey, this happened" genre. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 17:32, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The Philosophy and Phenomenological Research item is a short section, only three brief paragraphs, that gives a bare description of the idea and does not discuss its history, shortcomings, use in actual practice, or anything else that I'd expect from an in-depth discussion. (Other sections of the paper actually discuss empirical evidence, compare different thinkers, etc. The bit about the "political Turing test" might be the most insubstantial part of the paper.) It's coverage, but I can't honestly call it WP:SIGCOV. And of all the sources that have turned up so far, that's the one which probably went through the highest standard of review. Really, there's less and less here the more I look at it. Caplan works at Cato, so the Kling book is out. The only source in the list above that is independent, reliable, and close to substantial is the section in Galef's book (it's not a whole chapter). And one source isn't enough for wiki-notability. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 15:19, 21 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete Not seeing the substantial coverage needed to keep an article on a concept like this. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:22, 17 April 2021 (UTC)
 * : The requirement for notability is "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject", which this topic meets.  It might not be obvious, because JzG is repeatedly blanking the article and deleting all the references, so I will add them to my response here. — Omegatron (talk) 23:50, 17 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Social science-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 21:27, 17 April 2021 (UTC)


 * It seems as though some people without expertise in the subject of rhetoric are inexpertly reinventing Rapoport's rules and Rogerian rhetoric, in self-published works and poor quality sources, without knowing about the ideas long since invented by experts. &#9786; Uncle G (talk) 00:14, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * This is largely what grift-tanks do: appropriate the work of others, repackage it with spin, and publish it as if it were peerless wisdom. In this case, they did so on Wikipedia despite a clear COI, leading to bans and blacklisting. Guy (help! - typo?) 10:42, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * As Rogerian argument says, role reversal, which Rapoport attributed to Carl Rogers, is listening carefully and empathetically enough to be able to state the other's position to the other's satisfaction, and vice versa. For that matter, take the Carl Sagan passage referenced earlier: Towards the end of the course, students select a range of wildly controversial social issues in which they have major emotional investments. Paired two-by-two they prepare for a succession of end-of-semester oral debates. A few weeks before the debates, however, they are informed that it is the task of each to present the point of view of the opponent in a way that's satisfactory to the opponent—so the opponent will say, "Yes, that's a fair presentation of my views." How is the distinction between that and this more than a gimmick? XOR&#39;easter (talk) 22:33, 20 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete - Sources are unreliable ideologically partisan outlets, pace the statement made above, there is no significant coverage in reliable sources. Pure rubbish, undeserving of space in a fact-based encyclopedia. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:30, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep. Per WP:GNG, a topic is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article or list when it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. These sources exist—in addition to the sources listed by, the sources that provide significant coverage to the topic include at least one book chapter, at least two peer-reviewed journal articles, and two doctoral dissertations available on ProQuest.  As a result, I believe that the article meets notability standards and I oppose the deletion of the page. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 08:06, 18 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Note that the last 2 are both PhD theses. The second only briefly discusses ITTs and describes it as coming primarily from Hanson. The first thesis includes quite a bit of content, and describes putting together an ITT to gather data for some research. Empathetic Understanding and Deliberative Democracy is a repeat from Omegatron's list above. Jlevi (talk) 20:14, 23 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete The sources are either from within an ideological bubble, unreliably published (e.g., bloggy), or lacking in depth (e.g., a passing mention like "we admire scholars who can pass what Caplan calls the ideological Turing test"). At most, this should be a redirect like it was for years. As I wrote in an RfC last year that concluded it should not be mentioned in Caplan's infobox: Caplan slapped an obvious term on an idea mentioned by Paul Krugman, and advocated by teachers of debate and rhetoric well before Krugman too. "Ideological Turing test" isn't a contribution, it's branding &mdash; and it's not our job to propagate that. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 18:30, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * If the concept has a noted use in academia outside of the explicit references to the term "Ideological Turing text," then the article topic (namely the test) seems like it would be notable, although the article itself could use a better name. Although it might be better to redirect to a section of the Turing test page (or a subsection within the variants section) rather than to the biography if we decide to merge, since a redirect would seem better targeted to the concept itself rather than to the individual. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 22:19, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The topic is already covered at Rogerian argument, mentioned above; Turing test is about the philosophy of AI and shouldn't be bloated with ephemera that somebody happened to attach Turing's name to, I think. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 22:49, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Afterthought As an academic myself, I can testify that the invention of terminology is one of our primary work products. The number of jargon terms cooked up every year is staggering. I myself have invented a couple that have received a comparable amount of attention to this one (and in peer-reviewed papers, rather than blogs and pop books). Much as I'd love to have Wikipedia articles on my work, the base rate of coinages is so damn high that I can't say my contributions stand out, and if anything I've done does merit explication here, it's better served as a part of a larger whole. So too with "ideological Turing test": it's the furthest thing from a new idea, and the adoption rate of the new word is not actually impressive. For a point of comparison, there are an order of magnitude more Google Scholar results for "moral Turing test" (and unlike this one, that usage actually makes sense, as it is about testing a machine, like the Turing test is). XOR&#39;easter (talk) 04:28, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete I have to agree with XOR&#39;easter. This should be a redirect at best. Historyday01 (talk) 21:34, 18 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete sources are lacking in reliability, depth, or both. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  10:41, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete Sources weak, agree with other editors that it appears to be an old concept repackaged. Redirect should be restoredSlywriter (talk) 12:40, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Merge to the main Caplan article. This idea is only ever presented as Caplan's. There's probably enough material to write a paragraph in the Caplan article, but there isn't enough independent/substantive coverage to let it stand on its own. Jlevi (talk) 13:23, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The second source doesn't mention Caplan at all. For all we know, the guy talking about a "political Turing test" there came up with the branding independently (it's not the most imaginative name, after all). XOR&#39;easter (talk) 14:46, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete/Merge. There's not enough to maintain a stand-alone article.  What information there is here is basically WP:DICDEF, and the three or four sentences necessary to cover this topic can be adequately dealt with at the Brian Caplan article.  -- Jayron 32 15:08, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep as it's used in scholarly articles (see JLevi's list above) and on prominent blogs such as Lesswrong. It has been noted that this is not a new invention and has been used by rhetoricians, if there is an article that discusses this concept I would change my vote to Merge. Alaexis¿question? 05:58, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * As noted above, Rogerian argument already discusses the prior history of the concept. (Blogs, however prominent, are not generally reliable sources.) XOR&#39;easter (talk) 16:49, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep. Per Omegatron's reasoning. I checked the Rogerian argument article and it seems quite clear it's not the same idea. I invite everyone to check that article and form their own opinion. Pablo Stafforini (talk) 19:33, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * , we don't form our own opinions, we cite respectable, reliable sources to substantiate that reasoning. Can you show any sources that make that distinction between Rogerian argument and the ideological Turing test? Dirk Beetstra T  C 05:37, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I know what we do. I have been editing Wikipedia for eighteen years. I was inviting participants in this thread to check the article for themselves rather than rely on my characterization of it, or anyone else's. Pablo Stafforini (talk) 12:09, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep. Per User:Omegatron. On another note, some of the language used in this discussion so far has been pretty inflammatory. Atchom (talk) 03:24, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete/Redirect to Brian Caplan, this article currently boils down to 2 sentences defining what is an ideological Turing test (the other sentences do not result in claims of notability). --Dirk Beetstra T  C 17:26, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Redirect Julia Galef's new book is one good source, that's enough for a redirect but there needs to be more than that for a standalone article. Brian Caplan seems the obvious target for a section. User:力 (power~enwiki,  π,  ν ) 02:28, 24 April 2021 (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.