Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lie-to-children (2nd nomination)


 * 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 no consensus. &mdash; Coffee //  have a cup  //  beans  // 15:31, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Lie-to-children
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The title and concept are not notable. As presented, it's about analogies and simplifications in science but such conceptions are better dealt with under a different title as it's not just children that use these and they are not really lies. The real lies told to children are the common myths such as Santa Claus and the stork or the commonplace white lies which occur at all levels of society ("this won't hurt a bit"). This page shouldn't be getting in the way of those more substantial topics. Andrew D. (talk) 12:43, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions.  sst  ✈  16:47, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Merge to The Science of Discworld. The only sources I found discussing the term in detail are these: . It's not quite enough for a stand-alone article, and both reference teh book, with one actualy being a review of it. Much of the content of the present article seems to be original research. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:58, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — UY Scuti Talk  19:04, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete There seem to be no specific books, articles about the subject, and this amounts to original research. L.tak (talk) 15:34, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment - Wittgenstein's ladder metaphor is pretty well known (as is Schopenhauer's, which I think Wittgenstein was inspired by, though they use it a bit differently). This "lie-to-children" business looks pretty weak, but my initial reaction is to suggest renaming/reworking as something like Ladder (philosophy), stripping away the lie-to-children content and refashioning to be about the metaphor (insofar as the uses are conceptually linked). What keeps me from !voting keep is that just using the existing content to create that article would make something pretty poor. It may thus be best to blow this up and start from scratch. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 01:10, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I cannot support deletion. Wittgenstein's ladder is definitely a notable concept. There are a large number of books in GBooks discussing it at great length. That has to stay. I think that the concept of a simplified explanation that is less than completely accurate must be notable, but finding sources quickly is difficult due to the background noise produced by searches for "simplified explanation(s)" even when one adds terms like "inaccurate" or "children" to the search. It is going to take a lot of searching to determine the issue. I should point out that it is not necessary for sources to use the expression "lie to children" as long as they are talking about the same idea. Certainly it would be better to merge lie to children to the Discworld article than to delete it altogether. A search for "oversimplification" produces better results, including whole chapters of books. We should also check the page history as there are complaints on the talk page that the article has been messed up by incompetent editing, including removal of sources. There might be a better version of the page we can revert to. TNT is a terrible idea because, unlike stubification, it never results in improvements. James500 (talk) 08:05, 26 January 2016 (UTC)
 * This article states lie-to-children is a Wittgenstein's ladder. Maybe indeed Wittgenstein's ladder needs an encyclopaedic entry, but then we have to ask ourselves: is this the best starting point for that or is it better to start from scratch? I wouldn't object to moving and repurposing this to Wittgenstein's ladder though, but this "example-ladder" seems not sufficiently notable itself.... L.tak (talk) 18:45, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, North America1000 13:44, 27 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Comment - This is an article I keep coming back to and has slide down in quality over the years. Like others I can't support deletion, but Wittgenstein's Ladder is a valuable concept that if the article was re-written I'd like to see that take the focus. The article used to quote the passage from Tractatus about the ladder analogy. My advice would be to put it as a Start-Class Article for the Portal:Philosophy instead of just under Portal:Education. I think its good its already in the Philosophy of Science Category, it is an article that would need attention from an Expert and a clearer outline of how it pertains to epistemelogy and logic. I think the current nomination for deletion is a result of edits that were made in good faith to avoid the page being an orphan but ended up detracting from its overall value. If I remember right, it also made reference to Plato's Noble Lie (A lie told to unify society as opposed to a lie to help someone understand) in a far earlier version. Its usually been a hodge-podge article of people editing in and editing out material, I think a fix for this would be to add in a list of things the article has made reference to in past versions on the talk page. By using this list we can move forward by discussing each concept and if its fit for inclusion, and if it saying why it should be excluded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.185.165.41 (talk) 17:07, 29 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Please don't delete the general concept - I came to this page from a link to Wittgenstein's ladder and it explained the concept well. I agree that it would be better to re-list under the title Wittgenstein's ladder — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ganly (talk • contribs) 11:49, 3 February 2016 (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.