Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Quantum fiction (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. Even after discounting the few SPA votes, there is still no strong agreement on whether this is a notable neologism, although the "keep" side of the argument seems to have ever so slightly stronger arguments. Would recommend taking some time to clean up the article, get rid of bad references, clarify the definition, and then take another look at what it has become. -Scottywong | comment _ 17:05, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Quantum fiction
AfDs for this article: 
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Recreation of a deleted article as a vanity sop to a notorious spammer. Still a neologism without any substantial presence outside her spamming. Orange Mike &#x007C;  Talk  02:34, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 18:01, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science fiction-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 18:02, 9 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep - I saw the recreated article and undeleted the history so that editors can compare the current version to the version that was the discussion of the last AfD, and in fact the old version was userfied at User:Tlogmer/Quantum_fiction. Comparing the two shows that the result of the first AfD cannot apply to the current version which has been considerably enhanced. This article now has 51 references, and I would say that there is more than enough material to keep.  Ron h jones (Talk) 17:02, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
 * reply - take a closer look at those "references", Ron: many of them never mention the phrase; some are blogs; and at least one of them is either a copyright violation of the recreated article, or the recreated article is a copyright violation of the blog post! This thing reeks of bad original research and synthesis plus "referencing" by Google results dump. -- Orange Mike &#x007C;  Talk  23:40, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
 * If we delete every article that used blogs as references there wouldn't be much left. I just tend to browse the refs to make sure that are more reliable, and see if the ref includes the data - a quick re-look gives velocityebooks.com, www.publishersweekly.com, www.changingplanes.net and plenty of others to more than satisfy WP guidelines for inclusion. Some may be small sites, but they are not all blogs.  Ron h jones (Talk) 00:34, 10 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I note that User:Tlogmer is now, sadly, deceased. Should this AfD result be keep, then I suggest a history merge with User:Tlogmer/Quantum_fiction to keep all the attributions together. I can do that if the community is in agreement.  Ron h jones (Talk) 00:39, 10 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Weak Keep What's new here is the name, and the author's presumption that she's invented a new superset that includes science fiction. This (quantum effects in reality) is an old idea (cf. The Coming of the Quantum Cats; I'm not at all sure that was the first science fiction work to riff on this idea using this method.)htom (talk) 19:31, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Strong delete. Take out the blog references (which are not WP:RS) and the references not about the topic, and there's not much left. There's the novel by Vanna Bonta, and the use of the term by Charles Platt and a few others, but that's all. Furthermore, those things are not related, since Platt and the others write after Bonta, but never mention her novel. I can only conclude that the term is being used with different meanings, and therefore that there is no topic here and that the article is pure WP:SYNTH. -- 202.124.73.133 (talk) 12:28, 11 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep - This article shows a cultural emergence of 'quantum fiction' and documents and reflects the genre and its usage as a cultural evolution over more than a decade.  Usage, interest and the cultural expansion of the subject 'quantum fiction' as a genre is evidenced by citations that include: major newspapers, academic institutions, various authors, art critics, and multiple publishers. Verifiable sources include Publishers Weekly, The St. Petersburg Times, The Alexandria Gazette, Panorama Magazine (Mondadori),  Rodopi Publishers (Amsterdam - New York), NBC Television series, Scholarly Book Services, Avon Books, Cosmos Books, various University publications, as well as published books, both fiction and academic.  Additional citations of the term's usage include numerous authors (Ranse Parker, Wilson Harris, Audrey Niffenegger, Charles Platt, Vanna Bonta, Laurie Brenner, Jean-Philippe Toussaint among others) citing their published books as quantum fiction, and critics and reviewers have described a new NBC network television series with the term, calling the genre 'quantum fiction.'  Citations list book reviews that describe books and televisions as a 'quantum fiction' genre.  A doctoral thesis was presented by a PhD on quantum fiction as a new  genre and how it affects the marketplace. Several university dissertations on the term quantum fiction from various sectors, independently exploring an emerging genre; college courses.  Numerous citations in this subject reflect the coining of the term and over a decade of cultural, professional and academic development.   Tracking the usage of the term shows the development of usage and a genre that happened without the persons involved necessarily knowing or mentioning one another because a cohesive view of the emergence of the genre was not yet visible.  This is an interesting social study in and of itself -- how various authors and academics within years and time-frames of one another, used the term and explored the genre as pioneers.   Citations are provided evidencing the chronology of the emergence and cultural usage of the subject and genre 'quantum fiction' over more than a decade, a global occurrence, and the term appears globally in newspaper, books and other media (usage in US, Spain, Guyana, Caribbean, Italy etc). Since knowledge is the point of Wikipedia, this is a valuable resource. IMC.esq (talk) 20:48, 11 June 2012 (UTC)
 * — Note to closing admin: IMC.esq (talk • contribs) is the creator of the page that is the subject of this AfD. Dori ☾Talk ⁘ Contribs☽ 01:36, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The assertion that these unrelated uses of the term form a "genre" is classic WP:SYNTH. -- 202.124.73.13 (talk) 11:11, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Clearly all the usage, papers, books and discussion by sources are about 'quantum fiction' as a new literary genre.IMC.esq (talk) 20:47, 19 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep- The topic is clearly notable and this article itself is wonderfully researched. Marcus   Qwertyus   02:44, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   06:42, 17 June 2012 (UTC)



talk (talk) 16:29, 19 June 2012 (UTC) The Quantum Fiction article provides an overview of the use of the term “Quantum Fiction” as a developing classification for new works that explore unique narrative relationships with the reader as an observer. As written, the article attempts to prove that Quantum Fiction is a distinct genre. While this proposition is well supported by decent sourcing indicating that the term has been used in a variety of different places to mean a number of different things, nothing is presented which distinctly codifies Quantum Fiction as a distinct school. According to the List of Literary Genres page, “Literary genres are determined by literary technique, tone, content and by critic definitions of the genres.” While the specific technique, tone and content aspects of Quantum Fiction as presented by the article are nebulous and therefore hard to establish, the references in the article itself definitely indicate the existences of a body of critique recognizing the term as appropriate for describing the character particular works. For this reason alone, an article should exist; Wikipedia lists over 45 different genres in its section on christian writing alone ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Christian_genres .) The ambiguity surrounding the meaning of the term is, perhaps, not a bad thing. The root definition of the word quantum, from the 1610s, is “one’s share or portion.” ( http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=quantum&searchmode=none ) Thus, the term Quantum Fiction could be understood to mean any fiction which presents the world through the unique share of the perceptive apparatus allotted to the individual narrator. This idea, however, is never fully presented in the article itself. Likewise, the article presents a litany of different physicists who typify the type of thought embodied in Quantum Fiction, but fails to make any mention of Max Planck, the physicist who introduced the term quantum into the lexicon of the physical sciences (in 1900.) I would edit the article to remove length, to better summarize the unpredictable nature of the term & its application, and to provide proper recognition of Max Planck as the grandfather of quantum theory. Also, I would remove any occurrences of WP:SYNTH that came about from the original author’s attempt to prove the immutability of the term. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Owen_a_ferguson (talk • contribs) 16:29, 19 June 2012 (UTC) — Owen_a_ferguson (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep, with considerable edits.
 * Reply: Good contribution on Planck and clarity. IMC.esq (talk) 15:46, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment Quarantine (Greg Egan novel) is another example of this, predating the work pretending to the invention. Several of Egan's works probably would fall into this category (I'm not going to call it a genre.) Still keep, but weakest possible. Article needs lots of work. htom (talk) 03:59, 20 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Reply to Comment: Regarding title you suggest predates the one listed, verification shows the author of Quarantine would not agree; category is "hard science fiction" (premise is built on a physical device in people's brains). In fact Egan writes: "That Quarantine's central premise is far from any mainstream view of quantum mechanics is excusable; every science fiction novel is entitled to one outrageous hypothesis." IMC.esq (talk) 15:29, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep - The article is obviously relevant, there are numerous sources and it is being updated constantly. We should really keep this. 86.40.108.14 (talk) 12:44, 21 June 2012 (UTC) — 86.40.108.14 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep In my opinion, this article is obviously relelvant, there are several links, the page has a wealth of information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ultimatedriver (talk • contribs) 12:49, 21 June 2012 (UTC)  User has since been blocked for disruptive editing.


 * Delete as a non-notable neologism unsupported by sufficient reliable sources. The closing moderator should please note that a number of the 'keep' !votes are from new or nearly-single-purpose accounts, including a now-blocked editpr. - Dravecky (talk) 07:29, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
 * And some keep votes are from Admins. I would suggest that Dravecky lets the closing admin make his own decisions based on the arguments put forward and not on the users - this is supposed to be a discussion on the article, even a WP:SPA can make a comment, it's up to the closing admin to how much weight (s)he gives those comments.  Ron h jones (Talk) 00:06, 27 June 2012 (UTC)


 *  Strong Keep  - It's definitely an emerging genre and well written (most of it). Doesn't fit deletion criteria at all, not exclusively promotional at all. Its definitely informative and useful for other readers. Articles of this kind are very helpful to new authors, who very much rely on web. I came across this while I was browsing for information on a similar genre.Pilot03 (talk) 14:34, 25 June 2012 (UTC) — Pilot03 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * reply Ah-ha! It's WP:UPANDCOMING, the next big thing! -- Orange Mike  &#x007C;  Talk  02:51, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Do you seriously think that's what Susan Strehle means when she talks about the 'emerging genre' in her book Fiction in the Quantum Universe? Or are you just being silly? IMC.esq (talk) 10:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm pointing out that "emerging" can be a euphemism for "I think it's gonna be notable someday". As to Strehle: I've never heard of her or her purported publisher, and rather doubt that either can be considered a reliable source, although of course I could be wrong. -- Orange Mike &#x007C;  Talk  13:27, 28 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment - Closing admin: I have been trying to find explanations why this AfD starts with a personal attack by User Orange Mike on author Vanna Bonta (one of the first to publish and lecture about quantum fiction). New ideas are revolutionary but the reaction of silly nonsense accusation and hostility seem extreme. This user posted this AfD on User:Coredesat page - the admin who deleted Quantum fiction 5 years ago? but who has been retired 4 years. Back then, 5 years ago, (2007) Coredesat deleted an article on this subject, bypassing a Keep consensus, while this current AfD nominator Orange Mike was simultaneously calling for deletion of a Vanna Bonta article and posted patently false silly nonsense like this back in 2007 -- and was recorded in other forums encouraging others to dislike, harass and vote delete. Is this NPOV? With a group of identified friends (some with COI in genre publishing circles) who have become notorious for trying to discredit, it fits a pattern of cyberstalking, including delusion he "knows" his target. It's perplexing and seems out of place. Now -- to get back to the topic here: I just took a look at Wiki's list of literary genres. That article seriously needs some attention by non-vested interests and experts. I added a lead and some substantial info to the article. I was astonished at how biased to science fiction and lacking the article is and how many unsubstantiated, unsourced "genres" are listed in the scope of this User's Wiki Science Fiction project, as well as non-notable persons. The problem may be lack of understanding and non-professionalism or experience outside of a community at the root of this. Hope to contribute more in the future. There's no need for anything else here but an inspection of the subject, the article, the resources, and the citations, and NPOV. IMC.esq (talk) 06:35, 26 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Strong delete - It's both WP:NEO and WP:SYNTH, made worse by (as IMC.esq and htom demonstrated above) the fact that it doesn't have a clear definition. Dori ☾Talk ⁘ Contribs☽ 01:42, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Reply - Don't speak on my behalf. I demonstrated a very clear grasp of the definition. And htom, who actually voted Keep, brought up an interesting point where a distinction was necessary. I also demonstrated a grasp of Literature and genres (see my contributions to list of literary genres. Compare what it looked like before my contribution). Very important distinction: just because one person is not clear on the definition or does not understand the article does not equal that it and all the secondary verifiable sources do not exist. IMC.esq (talk) 02:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)


 * note to closing admin - the involvement of s.p.a. and new accounts in this matter is symptomatic of POV pushers and fringe enthusiasts; but then, you probably figured that out already. The idea that this is all a conspiracy by myself and other people actually familiar with publishing and fiction genres will be evaluated by you for what it's worth; I plan to ignore the ad hominem elements in favor of discussing the topic on its lack of merits. -- Orange Mike &#x007C;  Talk  13:27, 28 June 2012 (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.