Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Multiple histories


 * 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. What the article should be titled is an editorial question and likely should be discussed further. Seraphimblade Talk to me 01:11, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Multiple histories

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Unsourced for over 12 years. Two-word phrase that according to Google Scholar, is used in many very different ways, but without any underlying singular notable and independent concept. Even the examples from physics that the article talks about seem to be three separate and unrelated things. Thus, having an article under this term is inherently WP:OR and a fork of various other articles. Crossroads -talk- 05:54, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Crossroads -talk- 05:54, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. Crossroads -talk- 05:54, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Astronomy-related deletion discussions. Crossroads -talk- 05:54, 14 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete or redirect to Path integral formulation, I could not find any source where "multiple histories" is treated as an interpretation, but rather a way to describe path integrals.--ReyHahn (talk) 09:45, 14 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Sources added: keep and cross-reference from Many-worlds interpretation and path integral formulation. The most relevant cite is to Hawking arguing that a single cosmic history is impossible. A concept due to Feynman and Hawking probably deserves our attention, even if wrong! -- The Anome (talk) 10:26, 14 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete This is a fundamental misunderstanding of Hawking's proposal. He is not talking about our present point in time having multiple histories, as the article defends, but that multiple histories sprouted at the origin of the universe. Multiple future histories is vanilla Many-Worlds. Multiple past histories is nonsense. Tercer (talk) 13:36, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * From Hawking's "Populating the landscape paper": "The top-down  approach  we  have  described  leads  to  a profoundly different view of cosmology, and the relation between cause and effect. Top down cosmology is a framework  in  which  one  essentially  traces  the  histories  backwards, from a spacelike surface at the present time. The noboundary histories of the universe thus depend on what is being observed, contrary to the usual idea that the universe has a unique, observer independent history." Make of that what you will, but it seems consistent with the interpretation in the article. -- The Anome (talk) 22:01, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * My apologies, it turns out I was the one who misunderstood Hawking. He is talking about multiple pasts contributing to our present. In one sense this is trivial, as different possibilities interfere all the time to give rise to a single future in quantum mechanics; vanilla Many-Worlds wouldn't call them histories, as histories are usually defined as the possibilities that do not interfere. What Hawking proposed that is non-trivial is to do a path integral without an initial boundary condition, which corresponds to not having a well-defined initial quantum state. For the whole universe, of all things! Tercer (talk) 09:42, 15 March 2021 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Rename, redirect or merge -- I came here because it is classified as history related, which it is not. It is a cosmological interpretation from quantum mechanics.  Peterkingiron (talk) 15:20, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete per the nomination and 's comment below. There isn't a uniquely good redirect target, because the phrase is so common it has a variety of legitimate meanings. And the article has been tagged as needing expert attention since 2009, so there appears to be a lack of interest in making any sense out of it. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 19:24, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete As it stands the article is talking about two unrelated ideas that happen to use the same name. It can be salvaged if it can be rewritten to be about a well-defined concept, and if secondary sources can be found that discuss it. We should never base an entire article on a single primary source. Also, the relation to the Many-Worlds interpretation seems to be WP:OR: Hawking and Hertog do not mention it, and Hauser and Shoshany mention it only to say that it is not related. Tercer (talk) 10:00, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep The article has since been edited to address these problems. The lack of secondary sources is still a problem, the article is based only on Hawking and Hertog's paper and a newspiece about it. It's borderline, but I think it is no longer below the deletion threshold. Tercer (talk) 11:32, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   09:43, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Weak keep per and 's discussion. This doesn't look likely to be the seed from which a good article grows, but I think it preferable to have the comment on Hawking's view separate from any merge target I have so far thought of. &mdash; Charles Stewart (talk) 15:04, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep. The article, as it stands today, is not the same article that was originally nominated. Yes, the old article was deletable. The new article is coherent and meaningful and describes a worthy concept in physics. (Anome fixed it up in the intervening weeks. I recommend that the everyone who voted previously to take a look at the new version; they might change their mind.) 67.198.37.16 (talk) 21:02, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Rename to top-down cosmology, since everything not about that has been removed, that's what Hawking and Hertog actually called their idea, and "multiple histories" is just too vague. Currently, top-down cosmology is a redirect to a brief paragraph in Stephen Hawking, so the move would have to be done over the existing redirect. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 22:44, 28 March 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.