Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Vijendra K. Singh


 * 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   delete. &mdash; Cirt (talk) 00:33, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Vijendra K. Singh

 * – ( View AfD View log )

Does not meet WP:BIO or WP:PROF guidelines. No coverage from independent, reliable secondary sources. Tagged for quite some time without improvement. The only reliably sourced coverage I could find was a brief (and negative) mention in Autism's False Prophets, which doesn't seem like enough to satisfy notability guidelines or build a neutral encyclopedia article. MastCell Talk 21:36, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

The fact published here, that Dr. Vijendra K. Singh, Ph.D left the company, Brain State Technologies, is virtually the only reference on the internet that he does not endorse the company. Brain State technologies employees a corporate reputation monitor that inundates the internet with glowing reports about the company despite a number of consumer complaints and lawsuits. For this reason, his bio is relevant to consumers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Xjn7 (talk • contribs) 21:44, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete Doesn't meet WP:PROF guidelines. Consumer complaints have nothing to do with our notability policy. OhNo itsJamie  Talk 21:51, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Medicine-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 02:16, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 02:16, 22 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment. Subject appears to have a GS h index of 25 (albeit in a well-cited area) which would appear to pass WP:Prof. Would the nominator care to comment? Xxanthippe (talk) 02:25, 22 June 2011 (UTC).
 * I don't think that h-index is a criterion for notability, nor should it be. Notability criteria aren't arbitrary hoops to jump through; they're intended to ensure we can write decent encyclopedic coverage of a subject. An article reading: "Singh is a researcher with an h-index of 25" isn't particularly useful. Again, I don't see independent, reliable sources documenting a major impact by Singh on his field. Moreover, Singh is closely identified (in the lone independent, reliable source) with the claim that vaccines cause autism, a claim which enjoys zero scientific credibility. Thus, one could argue that far from having a "significant impact in his scholarly discipline", he has demonstrably failed to impact his field. MastCell Talk 05:16, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Your views are welcome, but academic Afds are determined on the basis of Wikipedia policy as interpreted by consensus of editors. If you look at these debates over the past few years you will find consensus that WP:Prof is be satisfied by impact of independent citations measured by citation count. In regard to numbers the precedent seems that to clearly satisfy WP:Prof 500-1000 citations in the scientific literature have usually been needed with an h index of greater than 15. Those with an h index of less than 10 rarely pass. There is no formal policy on this; it is just the way that decisions of editors have evolved over the past few years. Standards of notability for academics and scholars in the English Wikipedia are much higher than for some other subjects; garage bands, musicians or athletes sometime get by with only a handful of references. The acceptable number of citations also varies by subject. It is also not the job of editors of these pages to determine whether a subject's views are correct or incorrect, good or evil. We only determine if they are notable from having been noted, and in this case it is clear that the subject has been. Xxanthippe (talk) 07:08, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The purpose of WP:PROF, as with all special notability guidelines, is to indicate that the subject is likely to be notable. However, as the guideline itself states, "It is possible for an academic to be notable according to this standard, and yet not be an appropriate topic for coverage in Wikipedia because of a lack of reliable, independent sources on the subject. Every topic on Wikipedia must be one for which sources exist; see Wikipedia:Verifiability. For the routine uncontroversial details of a career, official institutional and professional sources are accepted as sourcing for those details." Are there reliable, independent sources on the subject? I don't know; I haven't looked. Have you, by any chance? NW ( Talk ) 13:04, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Question Does anybody have data on what WoS says about his citations, actual positions held, etc.? "Working at" a university in research is a nonspecific statement that spans everything from lab dishwasher to endowed chair professorship. I've been travelling, and my internet access is both slow and limited. Ray  Talk 10:46, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment I just looked in WoS, but there are too many persons named VK Singh to do a good citation analysis with any confidence. --Crusio (talk) 14:39, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Using the following search parameters:

Author=("Singh VK")

Refined by: General Categories=( SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY ) AND [excluding] Subject Areas=( PARASITOLOGY OR ALLERGY OR ASTRONOMY & ASTROPHYSICS OR MECHANICS OR METEOROLOGY & ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES OR TELECOMMUNICATIONS OR TRANSPLANTATION OR DERMATOLOGY OR RADIOLOGY, NUCLEAR MEDICINE & MEDICAL IMAGING OR ETHNIC STUDIES OR WATER RESOURCES OR FORESTRY OR GEOLOGY OR ELECTROCHEMISTRY OR COMPUTER SCIENCE OR METALLURGY & METALLURGICAL ENGINEERING OR MICROSCOPY OR THERMODYNAMICS OR RESPIRATORY SYSTEM OR AUTOMATION & CONTROL SYSTEMS OR SPECTROSCOPY OR FAMILY STUDIES OR UROLOGY & NEPHROLOGY OR GEOGRAPHY OR ANATOMY & MORPHOLOGY OR MATHEMATICAL & COMPUTATIONAL BIOLOGY OR BUSINESS & ECONOMICS OR SPORT SCIENCES OR INSTRUMENTS & INSTRUMENTATION OR CONSTRUCTION & BUILDING TECHNOLOGY OR ORTHOPEDICS OR CRITICAL CARE MEDICINE OR BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES OR EMERGENCY MEDICINE OR SOCIAL ISSUES OR TROPICAL MEDICINE OR OPTICS OR ACOUSTICS OR PSYCHOLOGY OR ANESTHESIOLOGY OR ENTOMOLOGY OR COMMUNICATION OR MARINE & FRESHWATER BIOLOGY OR CRYSTALLOGRAPHY OR MINING & MINERAL PROCESSING OR ENERGY & FUELS ) AND [excluding] Subject Areas=( CHEMISTRY OR POLYMER SCIENCE OR BIOCHEMISTRY & MOLECULAR BIOLOGY OR NUCLEAR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY OR AGRICULTURE OR IMMUNOLOGY OR RESEARCH & EXPERIMENTAL MEDICINE OR VETERINARY SCIENCES OR PLANT SCIENCES OR ZOOLOGY OR CELL BIOLOGY OR DEMOGRAPHY OR GASTROENTEROLOGY & HEPATOLOGY OR HEMATOLOGY OR GERIATRICS & GERONTOLOGY OR REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY OR GEOCHEMISTRY & GEOPHYSICS OR MICROBIOLOGY OR MATHEMATICS OR PHYSIOLOGY OR EDUCATION & EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH OR ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES & ECOLOGY OR IMAGING SCIENCE & PHOTOGRAPHIC TECHNOLOGY OR INFORMATION SCIENCE & LIBRARY SCIENCE OR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY - OTHER TOPICS OR MATERIALS SCIENCE OR SURGERY OR MEDICAL INFORMATICS OR OPHTHALMOLOGY OR CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM & CARDIOLOGY OR PALEONTOLOGY OR ENDOCRINOLOGY & METABOLISM OR MEDICAL LABORATORY TECHNOLOGY OR ROBOTICS OR NUTRITION & DIETETICS ) AND [excluding] Subject Areas=( ENGINEERING OR PHYSICS OR PATHOLOGY OR FOOD SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY OR GENERAL & INTERNAL MEDICINE OR LINGUISTICS OR ANTHROPOLOGY OR BIOTECHNOLOGY & APPLIED MICROBIOLOGY )

Timespan=All Years.

I have narrowed the references down to twenty articles. This may or may not be accurate, but it's the best I could do in a quick runthrough. Feel free to fix it if you can. Of them, only four are cited above 3 times, only two are cited above 5 times, and only 1 is cited above 50 times (4, 4, 7, 51). The paper with 51 citations is ; Singh is last author on that. It was written in 1985, so I'm not exactly sure&mdash;does that mean he was the principal investigator or last on the totem pole? But in any case, if the winnowing down has been done properly, that gives him an h-index of 4? A ways away from 25, even if we do accept the "h-index > 15 ==> notability" proposition. NW ( Talk ) 15:17, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete. Fails WP:PROF, not enough independent reliable sources to build a truly encyclopedic article. Yobol (talk) 16:14, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per MastCell and NW. Arbitrary numbers, such as h-index, need to be compared with some relevant reference. The article reads very promotional because of lack of in-depth coverage in WP:SECONDARY sources. Fails WP:GNG. FuFoFuEd (talk) 02:59, 28 June 2011 (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.