Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/List of films ordered by uses of the word "fuck" (3rd nomination)

NOR
Seems to me that many of these votes hinge on WP:NOR, so perhaps we should discuss that separately. Here's an example from the NOR page that just doesn't fit this page very well (one way or the other, IMHO): "'No original research' does not mean that experts on a specific topic cannot contribute to Wikipedia. On the contrary, Wikipedia welcomes experts. We assume, however, that someone is an expert not only because of their personal and direct knowledge of a topic, but because of their knowledge of published sources on a topic. This policy prohibits expert editors from drawing on their personal and direct knowledge if such knowledge is unverifiable. If an expert editor has published the results of his or her research elsewhere, in a reputable publication, the editor can cite that source while writing in the third person and complying with our NPOV policy. They must cite publications, and may not use their unpublished knowledge as a source of information (which would be impossible to verify)."

If we equate folks who have watched a particular film as "experts" in the # of times fuck is used in that film, then you could say they are using their direct knowledge. But this IS verifiable, and you could say that the film itself is the primary source. If the count is from a script, it is even more obvious.

Thoughts? -Jcbarr 15:04, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
 * That passage says "may not use their unpublished knowledge as a source of information". I take that to mean that the information (ie, the statistics) must have a source, ie, another party which has the same information already published. I dont think the film counts as a primary source because its not just a straight quote from a movie for instance; it is statistics derived from a process of researching through the movie. The lists are verifiable to some extent, but only if someone comes along and repeats the resarch that we've already done. Particularly because its numerical data, it would have to be verified by several people etc for exactness. I do see where you're coming from though, but.. it is borderline NOR. -- jeffth  e  jiff  15:13, 1 February 2006 (UTC)


 * (I think jeffthejiff beat me to most of what I'm about to say.) Your argument doesn't quite hold up, Jcbarr. Firstly, it's a stretch to classify people who have watched the films in question as "experts", this however is probably irrelevant. More importantly, NOR requires that the results of the research (in this case watching of the films and counting the occurences of "fuck") be published somewhere. The films themselves do not count as published results, they are just the raw data. (In the same way the number of obese people in a random sample of the general population is just raw data until a report on "The prevalence of obesity" is published.) A published article by a respected movie critic or in a respectable movie magazine/newspaper/website would in this case count as a source. "Publishing" the results straight to Wikipedia is not allowed by NOR. Wikipedia (in fact any encyclopedia) is not a primary source of information, it is a summary of primary and preferably secondary sources of info. Zunaid 15:29, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I have an argument other than the policy statement doesn't fit well. There's certainly a case to be made that this is OR.  But perhaps there is a way to fit it as acceptable as well.  I read this in detail after the quote above (it may be more relevant):
 * "Primary sources present information or data, such as archeological artifacts; photographs (but see below); historical documents such as a diary, census, transcript of a public hearing, trial, or interview; tabulated results of surveys or questionnaires, records of laboratory assays or observations; records of field observations."
 * In a broad sense, the movie itself is an "historical document", certainly the script is a "transcript". The question seems to be whether counting (which I would say is a trivial matter unlike "summarizing" in your example) is "research". I realized after the fact that my vote is actually based on the old version of WP:IGNORE because I think we ought to have some fun fluff. -Jcbarr 15:59, 1 February 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with Jcbarr that this isn't original research but for different reasons. It doesn't matter if they are experts or not.  It is interaction with a primary source document.  I think it is ridiculous to say that someone else has to watch a movie and tell us how many times it says Fuck.  The movie itself is the research.  This is different from the number of fat people in the population because that is unquantifiable knowledge.  This however, is finite knowledge.  It's not the number of fat people in the population in general but, instead, the number of fat people in a Dicken's novel.  It is not original research to open a Dicken's novel and count the number of characters described as fat.  Why would be original research to count the number of times a movies says the word 'Fuck'? Hdstubbs 15:55, 1 February 2006 (UTC)


 * And if you still don't buy that a movie is a valid primary source document then what about the scripts? Aren't most scripts available online?  Those are verifiable.  This list is interesting, useful and totally verifiable without being original research.  It would be original research if we said that this shows that society's morals are declining and using these numbers as proof.  Hdstubbs 15:48, 1 February 2006 (UTC)


 * What WP:NOR is driving at is that Wikipedia is not a publisher of first instance. So anything published on Wikipedia must be verifiable from other published sources.  In science, that is generally accepted as meaning peer-reviewed journals; in other areas such as history a citation from a well-established text is fine.  Here, there are no cited sources whatsoever. - Just zis Guy, you know? [T]/[C] [[Image:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|25px|  ]] 17:03, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
 * My point on this not fitting with WP:NOR is that this isn't science, and thus who knows what the reputable sources should be? Why not the script of the film itself?  The argument for calling this OR, IMO, is only valid if you're saying the act of counting is research (which is a valid concern). -Jcbarr 17:12, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
 * My take (feel free to disagree): The script does not qualify as a primary source. A primary source would be an already published document/review/etc. which lists a count of the word "fuck" in the movies in question. To use a very bad analogy (someone please come up with a better one): suppose I have a Honda S2000 (the script). I could put it on a dynamometer to determine its power output (i.e. count the words "fuck"). I could then write this up on Wikipedia claiming that it is verifiable by any one who dyno's the car (counts the words). For argument's sake let's just say all the S2000's in the world are perfect carbon copies of some original S2000 (i.e. all the scripts available are perfect photocopies of the original) so that you get the same answer no matter which car (script) you use. IMHO this is original unpublished research. You'd have to have official dyno results (word count) published by either Honda (the film-maker) or a reputable car magazine (movie review), which you could then reference. Wikipedia is not about doing the investigating, it is about reporting on the results of othersˈ investigations. BTW isn't there a higher process (RFC or RFA maybe?) where this OR question can be resolved? It might affect far more than just this one article, I'm pretty sure there are many articles that state "obvious" facts without the requisite references. Zunaid 09:04, 2 February 2006 (UTC)


 * The prohibition of original research only prohibits creating new primary sources. In this case the scripts of the films are the only primary sources and the article does not create any ones.  It's like observing in a court docket that there were three trials on a particlar day.  You can say "there were three trials" because you went to the original source and didn't create any new original sources.  You don't have to get someone else to count the trials for you. –Shoaler (talk) 17:42, 2 February 2006 (UTC)