Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Skathi (moon)


 * 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 speedy keep. Nomination withdrawn. (non-admin closure) Double sharp (talk) 07:04, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

Skathi (moon)

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

Despite the GA status, this article is in my view artificially inflated by re-explaining common facts to all irregular natural satellites, e.g. origins (which is mostly a glorified "we don't know much"), or even worse, explaining common facts to all astronomical objects, e.g. orbital inclination and eccentricity. Once one removes this, there is precious little content that is actually specific to Skathi: simply discovery, naming, rotation period, and the specific orbital elements, which is only enough to fill a table row rather than a full article. (And even the naming story is shared with other moons.) There are no specific sources only about this moon and thus notability does not appear to be met; see also discussion at Talk:Moons of Jupiter that makes the same point for almost all the irregular moons and found a broad consensus to redirect almost all of them. Propose redirection to Moons of Saturn, which already gives the orbital elements and discovery year ( has already added name etymologies to the Uranus and Neptune moon articles, and presumably etymologies will similarly be added soon to the Jupiter and Saturn ones). Double sharp (talk) 15:16, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Withdrawn by nominator: I am not completely convinced by the evidence provided, but consensus is unanimously for keeping, so there's no point in having this run any further. Double sharp (talk) 07:04, 8 January 2023 (UTC)


 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Astronomy-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 16:10, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep: At issue is whether or not the page passes GNG as the subject of multiple in-depth reliable sources. This NASA page is fully devoted to Skathi and is called "Skathi In Depth". Two different books devote at least a few paragraphs to Skathi itself: the Solar System Moons book by Blunck and the chapter on Saturn's icy moons in Enceladus and the Icy Moons of Saturn; both are cited with page numbers in the article. The book by Blunck particularly singles out Skathi's naming as a distinguishing feature. Skathi also appears as a useful and distinct case, either for its name or its physical features, in a number of scientific articles and books. In these links its features are dealt with as a separate entity distinct from other objects, and things about it are deemed interesting or informative enough to mention it specifically by name (With varying levels of detail: 1 2 3 4 5). Also, as a simple heuristic for GNG, the page had a thorough GA review and all of the questions about it were answerable using the sources available. The circumstances of this page have always been strange (its view counts are still the subject of an open phabricator ticket), but all that matters is that the page passes GNG. - Astrophobe  (talk) 16:26, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * The Blunck book (which I have) covers every single moon then known in the Solar System. Considering that consensus found most of them to be not notable enough, this does not by itself seem to be enough evidence (and besides, it talks more about the namesakes than about the moons). Similarly, such NASA pages exist for all the moons, and the sources presented are about irregulars in general, not Skathi specifically. Double sharp (talk) 16:30, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * The problem with discounting content related to the namesakes is that the naming of Skathi is probably its most important distinguishing feature, and the thing that reliable sources focus most on. This, and its usefulness (together with other objects in the same group) for testing theories about the formation of Saturn's moons, is probably the feature that its encyclopedic notability hinges on. - Astrophobe  (talk) 16:32, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * But that is more naturally covered by our article on the namesake: Skaði herself. Likewise, the usefulness of the irregulars in testing theories on Solar System formation is more naturally covered by the main article irregular satellite. Your argumentation would suggest copying and pasting the exact same content over a bunch of almost identical articles, one for each moon; IMO, that would seem to be an inefficient organisation, not to mention a maintenance nightmare. Double sharp (talk) 16:36, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * That argument is about WP:OTHERSTUFF. The overall intellectual organization of Wikipedia writ large is not of issue at the deletion discussion for this specific page. What matters is that this page passes GNG. Incidentally, I think this is enough back-and-forth, and I'll make this my last reply for a while. - Astrophobe  (talk) 16:40, 7 January 2023 (UTC)


 * Keep and speedy close. Well sourced and a Good article. Randy Kryn (talk) 16:36, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * I do not agree with speedy-closing a nomination that other editors (at a different venue) agreed with. Especially when my argument is precisely that the sources are sourcing irrelevant content, coverage is not in depth, and that the article in my view should not be a GA. To paraphrase it in a more familiar context: this article is in my view kind of like writing a full article about one nondescript stop on a long railway that has gotten no coverage outside the railway as a whole. Sure it can look excellent if the railway is well-covered by RS and we spend a whole lot of paragraphs writing about the railway instead of the nondescript stop, but is notability truly demonstrated by this? Double sharp (talk) 16:38, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep as per comments by Astrophobe. There is verifiable information available on the topic that comes from verifiable, independent secondary sources, and the topic is far more than merely mentioned in these sources. Amitchell125 (talk) 17:00, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * In at least one of those sources (19) the extent of the topic's mention is literally one entry in a table. That is certainly not "far more than merely mentioned" and is in fact pretty much precisely what WP:NASTRO warns about: Coverage must be specific and substantial: notability is not ensured just because an object is listed in a scientific paper or included in a large-scale astronomical survey. To establish notability, the astronomical object must have significant commentary in reliable sources, such as being one of the primary targets of a study with in-depth discussion (beyond discovery and basic parameters). On my phone now, will check the others later, but if memory serves it was similar. Double sharp (talk) 17:12, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep: it has enough sources to demonstrate notability. Moreover, I don't see what would be the benefit to Wikipedia in deleting this article. The problem with obscure astronomical objects is that nobody cares about writing a good article about them, and they end up as poorly maintained stubs forever. This is clearly not the case here. Tercer (talk) 17:03, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * In my view the benefit would be that we avoid having an article on something RS have not covered in depth per WP:NASTRO, and most of whose non-data content is not about Skathi, but about irregular moons in general, or about Skaði the goddess. Double sharp (talk) 17:14, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Can I ask that you please not tendentiously hector every Keep !voter? I don't want to respond to all of your responses and get into an exchange under every single !vote, but it's not productive for every comment by any editor to be followed by a rebuttal from the person who opened the AfD. - Astrophobe  (talk) 17:17, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Sure, if that's what you'd prefer. Need to sleep anyway, tomorrow I'll probably post a separate comment (not a reply) analysing the sources in detail. Double sharp (talk) 17:19, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep
 * WP:NASTRO 3 no? Ask me about air Cryogenic air (talk) 17:34, 7 January 2023 (UTC)


 * Keep, per WP:NASTRO, there is significant coverage about this object. It is one of the original 17 Norse moons and one of the 10 being given a name, some of which have articles of their own as well. Though I do agree that most of the references about this moon are just mere mentions of it. And by that reason I do not recommend this to be a GA article. Maybe lower it to B or C-class, perhaps? SkyFlubbler (talk) 17:58, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep I expected that removing small Saturnian moons that have nontrivial shape and size data would be controversial and possibly overzealous; the final decisions regarding the Saturnian moon articles were largely based only on size. For example, the light curves of the following moons were studied in Denk et al. (2018): Phoebe, Kiviuq, Ijiraq, Paaliaq, Tarqeq, Siarnaq, Albiorix, Bebhionn, Erriapus, Tarvos, Narvi (moon), Bestla, Skathi, Skoll, Hyrrokkin, Greip, Suttungr, Thrymr, Mundilfari, Hati, Bergelmir, Kari, Loge, Ymir, and Fornjot. –LaundryPizza03 ( d c̄ ) 18:06, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep on the grounds that this is the kind of thing I expect to see when I open an encyclopedia. The topic is well-defined and conceptually separate enough to warrant a page of its own;; the claims are supported by references that appear reasonably trustworthy. The point that such NASA pages exist for all the moons is an argument to have articles about all the moons, not an argument to delete this one. It's not conclusive by itself, but it leans in that direction. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 18:38, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep: As the person who started the discussion of limiting the number of irregular moon articles, I'll give this one a pass. Yes, there is not a lot known about it, but it's still a relevant subject (as with many others) of Denk et al.'s ongoing work on the Saturnian irregulars' rotation periods and poles. Skathi is the first known example of an outlier of the Norse group; even for multiple centuries, it remains on a relatively high inclination and is Saturn's closest retrograde irregular besides Phoebe.[ Although I did say I keep the largest 8 out of the 12 irregulars discovered in 2000, I didn't mean that authoritatively and it ended up being taken for granted unilaterally. I should have mentioned about having leeways in restricting articles, so I apologize for not making that clear beforehand. This article is well-written—calling it out for "glorifying" uncertainties and unknowns is a rather hyperbolic excuse. By your arguments for notability, that would mean deleting articles like and . [[User:Nrco0e|Nrco0e]] (talk) 18:44, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep per all above. This goes beyond what was originally proposed at Talk:Moons of Jupiter. SevenSpheres (talk) 19:43, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * WP:SNOWBALL Keep: notable. I have no issue with re-explaining facts common to other articles. We shouldn't be assuming that the reader already has that background, and WP:NOTPAPER applies. Praemonitus (talk) 22:03, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Keep this nomination for deletion of an article about a near-earth celestial object is an absurd waste of everyone's time and a perfect example of tunnel vision in re Wikipedia management jengod (talk) 06:49, 8 January 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.