Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Philosophy

WikiProject Philosophy Deletion Discussions

This is a collection of discussions on the deletion of articles related to Philosophy. It is one of many deletion lists coordinated by WikiProject Deletion sorting. Anyone can help maintain the list on this page.

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Further information

For further information see Wikipedia's deletion policy and WP:AfD for general information about Articles for Deletion, including a list of article deletions sorted by day of nomination.

Archived discussions (starting from September 2007) may be found at:

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Articles for deletion

Cristian Ciocan

Cristian Ciocan (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View AfD | edits since nomination)

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BLP with no indication of notability. TheTechie@enwiki (she/they | talk) 04:31, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Academics and educators, Authors, Philosophy, and Romania. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 05:33, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
• Keep. Pass of WP:Prof#C1 in a very low-cited field. May pass WP:Prof#C8 with a rather recent journal. The nominator has been on a deletion spree today. Xxanthippe (talk) 08:24, 3 January 2025 (UTC).
• Keep per WP:NACADEMIC #8. Warm Regards, Miminity (Talk?) (me contribs) 11:55, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
• Keep. I think the case for WP:PROF#C8 as founding co-editor-in-chief of a notable journal is clearest, but he also has a weak case for WP:AUTHOR through multiple published book reviews [1] [2] [3]. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:29, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Democrates

Democrates (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View AfD | edits since nomination)

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I humbly submit that this article may safely be either taken down, merged, or changed to a redirect. Its principal claim to notability, I believe, is the occasional misattribution of Democritus’s sayings or likeness to one Democrates.

With regard to the former, according to our article on Democritus, Diels and Kranz attribute these sayings to Democritus, and this article repeats this attribution. As for the likeness, it can hardly be denied that the bust in the picture is stamped “Democrates,” and, indeed, the Wedgwood Museum’s website seems to list the very piece here under that name; that Museum’s website is hardly informative. Now, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has a similar piece also stamped “Democrates” but clearly catalogued as “Democritus.” Did someone at the Wedgwood company repeatedly make the same mistake? This hardly seems unlikely to me, but what say my fellow editors?

I do confess that the likeness is unlike some of those we have for Democritus, as that in the Villa of the Papyri, but it is hardly unlike his representation in numerous other portraits. Indeed, the painting by Coypel, loath as we may be to accept the authenticity of so modern a vision, seems based on an old tradition; a cursory search will, I believe, at worst, reveal to anyone conflicting traditions of his appearance with, nonetheless, a bias towards that seen in the Wedgwood bust. A worker at the company might have repeatedly made the mistake of labeling the likeness "Democrates", but did Coypel, who predates it, mistake with "Démocrite"? And many other artists in the tradition of the “laughing” or “smiling philosopher”?

That he was the founder of the basic concepts of democracy is obvious nonsense. (Among other consideration, were he a contemporary of Apollonius of Tyana, he would have lived centuries after the heyday of Athenian democracy!)

Mind you, Democrates is not an invalid Greek name. There is Democrates of Aphidna, and it is also attested to in, e.g., this article about Euripides, this work of the theologian Sepulveda, and, as I gather, a genus of beetles. Indeed, Livy apparently states that a Democrates led the Tarentines at the Battle of Sapriportis, but, although the name on that article links to the page about the supposed philosopher, their biographies could hardly agree. Furthermore, the name appears on the list of Druze prophets on this page, but I can find no citations to that effect. (This last, in particular, might make me suspect a hoax, though I make no such formal accusation here!)

Even if the Democrates article gave dates significantly after the laughing philosopher, they would not account for the difference in dates between the Tarentine commander and the Druze prophet, and, even if they did, they would not account for the article’s lack of biographical detail, unless a military command and posthumous religious veneration do not qualify as notable!

But, forgive me: I understand that those links need not really enter into the argument; they were, no doubt, added in good faith, or, at least, the one from the Tarentine commander to the supposed philosopher was.

Also, regarding biographical detail, the noted epistle of Apollonius seems to me suspect as a citation, for, as we have said, Democrates is a genuine Greek name, and the mere existence of an Apollonian contemporary by that name hardly justifies the rest of the article. (Also, in fact, it is epistle 96, not 88, but that may be beside the point!)

What harm would be done by noting more fully the occasional attributions to Democrates on Democritus’s article and changing Democrates’s to a redirect to Democritus? Or perhaps a disambiguation page could disambiguate things: a link to Democrates of Ephidna, a link to Sepulveda, a link to and a note on Democritus, and a note about the military commander. Pleased to take further part in the debate but better able to leave the question to more sage considerations than my own, I am sincerely yours, Twozenhauer (talk) 00:50, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Authors, Philosophy, History, and Greece. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 02:37, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

  What about the Golden Sentences/ Golden Maxims of Democrates? This seems to be attributed to him even if nothing else is? I think the disputed historicity is clearly displayed in the article, so as it stands I am happy to keep, maybe with more commentary on historicity?Spiralwidget (talk) 15:43, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

Reply to Spiralwidget: Thank you for your consideration of this matter! But even considering the Golden Sentences, I am in favor of one of the options I have mentioned above. Near as I can tell, the article’s best quality is its statement that “many scholars argue that these maxims all originate from an original collection of sayings of Democritus”; granted, as the article goes on to say, “others believe that there was a different little-known Democrates whose name became confused with the much better-known Democritus.”

But with regard to the former statement, I refer my fellow editors also to this article by a scholar named Searby, which I quote here:

“The two most important sources for the ethical fragments of Democritus are Stobaeus' Anthology and the so-called ‘golden maxims of Democrates’ (a much discussed misnomer). Through a careful comparison, [the scholar Gerlach] confirms Lortzing's conclusion that Stobaeus utilized a collection of Democritus' maxims nearly identical with the pseudo-Democrates collection, which, for [Gerlach], has the methodological consequence of making Stobaeus an indirect witness to that tradition, complicated by the thematic rearrangement in the Stobaean anthology.” (emphasis mine)

But, truth be told, I have not found a tremendous amount of discussion per se; scholars seem by-and-large in agreement about “pseudo-Democrates”. Another confident attribution of the sayings to Democritus is this somewhat older piece by M. L. West.

I do not have access to the Democrates article’s cited The Atomists, Leucippus and Democritus (though it is mentioned in the Searby review cited above), but, in the article’s defense, I could advance this notice from 1925, which seems to present the attribution of Democrates to Democritus as somewhat new; but, even if I did so, I would have, at best, to advance merger of the Democrates article with that of Democrates of Aphidna: the noted dissertation by Philippson is a refutation of one Laue’s dissertation from 1921, in which the latter scholar, according to this contemporary report, advanced Democrates of Aphidna as the author of the sayings, which were apparently already widely attributed to Democritus. The report speaks of the same Philippson paper thus:

“Philippson is led to discuss the authenticity, character, and transmission of the ethical precepts of Democritus in reviewing H. Laue's dissertation . . . Laue's main contention is that the collection of precepts bearing the name of Democrates is not to be ascribed to Democritus, but to the Attic orator of that name from Aphidna. On this basis Laue tries to distinguish the style and content of the Democrates maxims from what he considers to be the genuine sayings of Democritus. Philippson points out that thirty-one precepts of the Democrates collection appear also in Stobaeus, and probably more were contained in the lost eclogues. Therefore the testimony of the Stobaeus MSS., which show the frequent occurrence of Democrates for Democritus, although the latter predominates, makes it highly probable that the author of the sayings in the above collection was Democritus. Moreover Lortzing has shown that Stobaeus obtained his Democritus precepts from the same source from which the Democrates collection was derived . . . . “ (emphases mine)

So, I submit that note of the conflicting attributions might be made on the articles for both Democritus and Democrates of Aphidna; Democrates as we have it may, I believe, be deleted or changed to a redirect, but hardly stand as it is: at very least, he is not the only Democrates, and his article’s title should not suggest that he is the standout holder of that name!

This is more by way of a postscript: Is it not also curious that the note at the beginning of the article calls him a first-century philosopher? His supposed correspondence with Apollonius would place him then, but the article goes on to say that his Ionic dialect is evidence of composition at “a very early period”; but then his possible contemporaneity with Julius Caesar seems to bring him closer to the first-century (but B. C.!) date. But this could be fixed even were the article retained. Twozenhauer (talk) 06:37, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Ethics of simulated suffering

Ethics of simulated suffering (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View AfD | edits since nomination)

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Does not appear to be a robust philosophical concept needing its own article. Two sources provided are self-published and not covered by reliable independent sources. The "connection to catostrphic risks" seems like WP:OR/WP:SYNTH and not directly supporting the notability of the concept itself. If anything, a brief mention of ethical concerns in simulated reality seems sufficient. ZimZalaBim ^talk 15:47, 15 December 2024 (UTC)

I don't think the concept is notable enough in itself. But some of it could probably be merged into the article ethics of uncertain sentience. Alenoach (talk) 17:22, 15 December 2024 (UTC)

• Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. Shellwood (talk) 17:31, 15 December 2024 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 08:48, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 09:32, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

• Delete as WP:SYNTH-y, navel-gazing cruft. XOR'easter (talk) 19:42, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
• Weak Keep - seems page is recently created and looks WP:SYNTH as noted above, but this is a growing field in philosophy - maybe template/category for stubs (philosophy, tech, ethics?) can be added? Asteramellus (talk) 19:57, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

  Adding a stub notice isn't a fix for the problem. XOR'easter (talk) 19:59, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

  Yes - only reason I thought it might help with stub is bring attention to the page to get some more edits possibly. Asteramellus (talk) 20:18, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

  Stub notices don't really do that. They sit around for years unattended. XOR'easter (talk) 18:02, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Categories for deletion

This is a collection of discussions on the deletion of articles related to Logic. It is one of many deletion lists coordinated by WikiProject Deletion sorting. Anyone can help maintain the list on this page.

Adding a new AfD discussion

Adding an AfD to this page does not add it to the main page at WP:AFD. Similarly, removing an AfD from this page does not remove it from the main page at WP:AFD. If you want to nominate an article for deletion, go through the process on that page before adding it to this page. To add a discussion to this page, follow these steps:

1. Edit this page and add {{Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PageName}} to the top of the list. Replace "PageName" with the relevant article name, i.e. the one on the existing AFD discussion. Also, indicate the title of the article in the edit summary as it is particularly helpful to add a link to the article in the edit summary. When you save the page, the discussion will automatically appear.
2. You should also tag the AfD by adding {{subst:delsort|Philosophy|~~~~}} to it, which will inform editors that it has been listed here. You may place this tag above or below the nomination statement or at the end of the discussion thread.

There are a few scripts and tools that can make this easier.

Removing a closed AfD discussion

Closed AfD discussions are automatically removed by a bot.

Other types of discussions

You can also add and remove other discussions (prod, CfD, TfD etc.) related to Logic. For the other XfD's, the process is the same as AfD (except {{Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName}} is used for MFD and {{transclude xfd}} for the rest). For PRODs, adding a link with {{prodded}} will suffice.

Further information

For further information see Wikipedia's deletion policy and WP:AfD for general information about Articles for Deletion, including a list of article deletions sorted by day of nomination.

Archived discussions (starting from September 2007) may be found at:

• WikiProject Deletion sorting/Philosophy/archive

watch