Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of nuclear holocaust fiction


 * 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. Seraphimblade Talk to me 01:31, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

List of nuclear holocaust fiction

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Mostly unreferenced, fails WP:NLIST/WP:IPC/WP:INDISCRIMINATE. Could redirect to Nuclear weapons in popular culture of which it is effectively a fork of anyway, just in a list format. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 14:53, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Science fiction and fantasy and Lists. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  14:53, 27 March 2023 (UTC)


 * Delete strikes me as an archetypal glorified category. Not seeing any benefits to having this information in article form, especially when it’s in two completely different formats like someone got bored halfway through constructing the page. Dronebogus (talk) 17:18, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep Distinct enough genre, and the article itself being in different formats is not a reason to delete it. Categorisation is usually self-evident, so lack of sources isn't reason to delete. Jamezofchez (talk) 19:23, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep The current content of Nuclear weapons in popular culture has little overlap with our list here. This list provides a navigation function. List allows for commentary, one of the advantages of lists, see in general WP:CLN. Most importantly, there are significant secondary sources discussing the thing as group: Full books: Nuclear holocausts: Atomic war in fiction, 1895-1984, The Nightmare Considered: Critical Essays on Nuclear War Literature. Science Fact and Science Fiction has paragraphs of discussion on p. 48-49 as part of the chapter "Atom Bomb". The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy has a dedicated entry "Nuclear War" in volume 2, p. 562-564. That should be sufficient to fullfill WP:NLIST, as we could easily write Nuclear holocaust in fiction as the companion article to our list here. In addition, many secondary sources dedicated to sub-topics exist, like Nuclear-War Themes in Soviet Science Fiction, Nuclear Holocaust in American Films, Nuclear fiction for children, etc. The fact that the formatting is not uniform within the article is unfortunate, but a typical issue that can be solved by normal editing and therefore not at all a reason for deletion. Daranios (talk) 20:24, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Merge properly to List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction. I've reconsidered, contrary to what I originally thought, the "Cause" column at this target would allow for a merge without loss of collected information, if we agree to introduce the entry "War, nuclear" or some such (instead of only "War") and merge at least all blue-linked entries. While I still think our topic here fullfills WP:NLIST, merging to the parent topic list - which has somewhat better formatting place - avoids duplication and will make maintenance easier in the long run (and we no longer have to quibble about notability). Daranios (talk) 20:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * @Daranios I think that's a reasonable solution, but I remain concerned, as always, about merging unreferenced content... Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 02:52, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Ps. The problem with the current list is that it classifies as nuclear holocaust any work in which nuclear war happened, even if it happened long ago and has relatively little impact on the work. We have Planet of the Apes, Star Trek: First Contact, Terminator, The Matrix, Battlestar Galactica, Dark Angel and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, among others... I very much doubt any RS classifies those works as related to nuclear holocaust/war/etc. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:00, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * PPS. This would be good to use to add a bunch of references: Nuclear Holocausts: Atomic War in Fiction. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:01, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * "I very much doubt any RS classifies those works as related to nuclear holocaust/war/etc." Randomly taking two of your examples: Planet of the Apes: ; Terminator:, . So taking these two as a baseline, I have no problem of assuming in good faith that previous editors have used the primary sources (which are present) in a reasonable way, until I see evidence to the contrary. Daranios (talk) 15:09, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. Thanks for finding the sources, I encourage you do add them to the article if you haven't done so yet. I am happy to be proven wrong, if sources can rescue this content - it's win-win. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:42, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, why not. I've added them now. Daranios (talk) 10:30, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
 * @Daranios Thank you. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 12:46, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep This is a well-recognized genre of fiction as characterized by the large number of entries on the list. If the nominating editor had a concern, perhaps they could have mentioned it in the article's talk page first for improvement before doing a drive-by shooting.MartinezMD (talk) 21:13, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Comment As is par for the course when it comes to fiction lists, this is a poorly-sourced mess that hinders rather than helps proper encyclopaedic coverage of the topic at hand. I find the argument that the list serves a navigational purpose wholly unpersuasive; it seems exceedingly unlikely that anybody looking for e.g. the A Canticle for Leibowitz article would come to the List of nuclear holocaust fiction article in order to find it. It also obviously falls flat for the list entries that do not have articles to link to. I likewise find the argument that a benefit of a list is that we can add commentary unpersuasive—that's how we've ended up with a whole bunch of embarrassingly poor TV Tropes-style lists in the first place. I don't really understand how the editors arguing in favour of keeping the article think a "finished" version of this article would look. The Nuclear weapons in popular culture article is not exactly in great shape, but that at least has the potential to become a high-quality (or at minimum decent) article covering the topic. As far as lists go, this would also seem to be wholly redundant to List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, since a nuclear holocaust is a type of apocalypse. TompaDompa (talk) 22:08, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I fully agree that someone looking for e.g. the A Canticle for Leibowitz would not go through here - if I am interested in a specific work and know the title I will just search it directly. The navigation help rather is for someone like "Leibowitz was for me, I wonder what other fiction there is featuring a world destroyed by nuclear holocaust?". Or "Nuclear holocaust gives me the facts, now I wonder where can I see or read this pictured in fiction?" The argument that providing short commentary in lists is an advantage does not originate with me, it's a consensus expressed in the form of being part of the WP:CLN guideline. Daranios (talk) 10:44, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * That's not serving a navigational purpose then, it's serving as a catalogue or list of recommendations. An article that aids navigation helps you if you want to find a specific article, but don't know the title of the article you want. As for commentary being an advantage: I know the argument does not originate with you, but you presumably think it somehow applies to this article since you brought it up. I don't think it applies to this article, since adding commentary to lists like this ends up making the article worse rather than better. Not all topics lend themselves to lists—topics on fiction usually don't, and I don't see that this would be an exception. This is simply not a good way to cover a topic like this. And it's redundant to another list to boot. TompaDompa (talk) 14:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * "helps you if you want to find a specific article" - That would work, too, if there is indeed a sentence of summary there. Maybe that's a rare use, maybe not, but one put forward by WP:LISTPURP. "list of recommendations" - In the form of a value judgement, I'd say no, because the critereon we could apply is appearance in secondary sources/being notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. In the form of, "If you want to know more, we have information for you here", yes. Be that as it may, your definition of navigation is not the only one for which lists on Wikipedia are meant for: WP:AOAL has right as it's first point "Good for exploratory browsing of Wikipedia." That's what I was describing. If this is a good way to approach this topic, I guess we can agree to disagree. As for the overlap with List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction (which incidentally also has a column for adding commentary), see below. Daranios (talk) 15:39, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Exploratory browsing and navigation are completely different things. If exploratory browsing was what you meant, then fair enough, but that's not a reason to have a list article as opposed to a proper prose article; exploratory browsing is an advantage of lists as compared to categories. Prose articles on fiction-related topics are way better for exploratory browsing than lists are except for in a small number of specific circumstances (mainly when the connection between entries is strong and the list can be made complete, such as List of James Bond novels and short stories). And of course this list is self-evidently not even constructed to serve that purpose, because it includes a bunch of WP:REDLINKS. This list is a hobby project, a TV Tropes-style list without much in the way of encyclopaedic merit. List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is far from being even decent in terms of quality, but this list is entirely redundant to it and really has no valid raison d'être. TompaDompa (talk) 15:59, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * More of a general question out of this specific reasoning: WP:LISTPURP says "Lists which contain internally linked terms (i.e., wikilinks) serve, in aggregate, as natural tables of contents and indexes of Wikipedia." This would be the case for more or less all lists mirroring reasonable categories. Aside from the additional WP:LISTN requirement, you stated that still "Not all topics lend themselves to lists". Is there any guidance on which topics lend themselves to lists then, or is this rather a matter of opinion, i.e. decided through local consensus? Daranios (talk) 15:08, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I entirely understand the question, but most topics don't lend themselves to lists. Wikipedia prefers prose, see e.g. WP:PROSE. There is WP:SALAT and WP:NOT for further guidance in general. TompaDompa (talk) 16:09, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep Daranios' analysis demonstrates that the topic meets GNG, and a sensible, appropriate list can be made and maintained through regular editing. Jclemens (talk) 04:10, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Delete - The nom. raises three policy issues where this fails. Daranios addresses WP:NLIST and demonstrates that notable lists similar to this are possible, but inadevrtently shows why this list really does fail on WP:INDISCRIMINATE. This is a list of short and long fiction, music, comics, animation, games, films and television on the topic of nuclear holocaust, including notable and non notable examples. It is the very definition of indiscriminate, and as Daranios has shown, notable lists are more carefully drawn in practice, being, for instance, nuclear war themese in soviet fiction, or nuclear fiction for children. Note that even then, the first of those is only about written fiction, the second is about the subject in general and appears to make no attempt to be comprehensive. The third example restricts itself to films. Because this list is indisriminate it is also impossible to maintain. If kept it will remain an incomplete, unsourced and unhelpful list. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:33, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * So do I understand correctly that you would be fine with having separate lists for various genres (i.e. splitting it more or less according to the sections we now have)? As for "It is the very definition of indiscriminate", which of the four points of WP:INDISCRIMINATE do you actually think applies here? Now I can understand the goal to avoid a WP:TVTROPES-like listing of all instances of nuclear holocaust appearing in fiction, but that can easily be solved by limiting this to blue links in keeping with the navigational nature of the list. That way it is not an indiscriminate (in the normal language sense) list, it is limited to what entries we have on Wikipedia. I personally think we should additionally include treatments which are not notable enough to have their own article if they can be supported by secondary sources in keeping with WP:ATD-M. And that's also my dividing line where may need secondary sources and where we don't. Daranios (talk) 11:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes, you understand correctly that I think some kind of list, based on suitable sources, is possible. But I also thought about what is required to bring this page to that, and we basically have WP:TNT, because:
 * The list needs to be written sources or films or whatever... WP:IPC is an essay, not policy, but having the list cover all media almost certainly fails it under WP:NLIST which says One accepted reason why a list topic is considered notable is if it has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources. There is no evidence that this list, covering all media, is described as a group anywhere. Although the above evidence does not demonstrate this, I think it is very plausible that there are specific lists of, say, films on the subject of nuclear war. The problem with keeping this article is that we don't know which it is. It needs to be one thing and not all of them, and then a source describing that collection can be the basis of a list.
 * Even if we accepted the above, and deleted everything but one medium, we still have to rename the list per Xx236.
 * The list needs clear inclusion criteria. One key criterion is likely to be notability.
 * Note that the third issue there is cleanup, and as we are all aware, deletion is not for cleanup. Except WP:TNT. In this case we have a list that is so indiscriminate that any attempt to rectify jettisons most of its content (and we have no lead as to which content should be retained, an edit war seems baked in). More content is lost by restricting to notability, and the list also has to be taken through Requested Moves. The fiction content is much more fully covered in List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, which list is properly sourced. What is lost if we delete this? An unsourced list of information that is likely available elsewhere. This list should not exist in this form in WP Mainspace. I would, however, be content with "draftify" if anyone wanted to mine it for lists that are not WP:INDISCRIMINATE (summary only collection), and indeed WP:N and WP:GNG Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 14:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * "There is no evidence that this list, covering all media, is described as a group anywhere." So what about The Nightmare Considered: Critical Essays on Nuclear War Literature, which claims to cover "a wide range of fiction, film, poetry and drama" (p. 2), Science Fact and Science Fiction and The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy? And if notability would be used as a critereon, WP:TNT would not at all apply, because then only a fraction of the current content (lacking blue links) would need to be removed (or bolstered with secondary sources), while the majority would be kept. "summary only collection" does not apply then, because if a work of fiction has an article on Wikipedia, there have to be sources describing more than summary at the target article. The one serious argument I see against this list, also raised by is the overlap with List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, of which this is basically a sub-genre. The advantage of this list is that, well, we have a list for this sub-genre available. This is counterbalanced by the need to improve and maintain it. I have no serious objections against a merge with List of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, but then we would likely loose this distinction between parent- and sub-topic. So I personally still slightly tend towards keep in the balance of those points. Daranios (talk) 15:39, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * The Nightmare Considered does not discuss the topic as a group or set. Does not evidence WP:NLIST. I can't see the text of page 2, but it is clearly talking about a genre of literature (so sans music, games etc) with no list, group or set, but with papers on some specific titles. The rest of my comments stand. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 15:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * The Nightmare Considered is also a collection of essays on various specific aspects of the topic, as opposed to a book on the overarching topic. The science fiction encyclopedias referenced are certainly usable sources for the Nuclear weapons in popular culture article, but trying to apply them here is to my eye fitting a square peg in a round hole. TompaDompa (talk) 16:10, 28 March 2023 (UTC)


 * Comment If kept, the name should be changed or sourced. The word Holocaust has its meaning and there are protests against similar uses.Xx236 (talk) 10:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Interesting, I did not think about that. You can see already from the titles I have listed above that "Nuclear holocaust" is indeed used by secondary sources. But changing the title to List of nuclear war fiction would be fine with me, both terms seem to appear (equally?) in sources, and if we can have a title without a controversy behind it, why not. Daranios (talk) 11:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * @Xx236 @Daranios The issue here is the existence of the nuclear holocaust article. If the name has been criticized, that would be good to mention in that article. If it is considered very improper, a WP:RM could be started. Right now I don't think the article mentions any criticism of the term. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 02:51, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I don't really know, but this paper is very interesting. It says that the "nuclear holocaust" is and has been quite common, but on p. 51 touches on the critcism of using the term holocaust loosely. And, sure, this discussion is relevant for the nuclear holocaust article and our list here. Daranios (talk) 10:52, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * @Daranios Maybe copy this subthread to the article's talk page? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:43, 30 March 2023 (UTC)


 * Keep Distinct enough genre, I agree some items should be removed, but that is not a deletion reason. Slatersteven (talk) 10:43, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep This genre does exist. Just discuss on the talk page what can be fixed with normal editing method.   D r e a m Focus  12:30, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * The policy reasons for deletion are WP:NLIST and WP:INDISCRIMINATE. How does the existence of a genre relate to these issues? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 13:46, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * WP:ITSUSEFUL I guess? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 14:29, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * If there are secondary sources talking about this as a genre, then they are in effect talking about the works of fiction belonging to this genre "as a group or set", therefore fullfilling WP:NLIST. For such sources, see Science Fiction: A Very Short Introduction, p. 109-110, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Juli 1988, p. 24-27, Nuclear Proliferation in South Asia, p. 187-, Rumors of War and Infernal Machines. Daranios (talk) 19:48, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * WP:NLIST clearly states Lists that fulfill recognized informational, navigation, or development purposes often are kept regardless of any demonstrated notability. Plenty of blue links, a legitimate categorization, it should keep.   D r e a m Focus  20:53, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Having plenty of blue links is not the same thing as fulfilling recognized informational, navigation, or development purposes. I'd also note that the quoted passage seems descriptive rather then prescriptive. TompaDompa (talk) 21:20, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * How is it not navigational? And the lists also shows far more information than a category could.   D r e a m Focus  05:18, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I'll refer you to the comments I made on the subject above. TompaDompa (talk) 05:40, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep: Meets CLN/AOAL  // Timothy :: talk  21:06, 4 April 2023 (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.