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 ~~KEEP~~, withdrawl of nomination. Non-admin closure per WP:DPR -Penwhale | Blast the Penwhale 03:12, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm correcting the closure to No consensus. Withdrawal is only grounds for an automatic keep closure if no delete opinions are present, which is not the case here. (The same goes for non-admin closures.) This is of course only relevant for potential future nominations, since No consensus defaults to Keep. ~ trialsanderrors 22:50, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Basin Groups[edit]

~~"Basin Groups" is not a recognized geologic era of the Moon Lunokhod 10:13, 15 January 2007 (UTC)~~ Note: See bottom for nominator's withdrawl -Penwhale | Blast the Penwhale 03:12, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delete: I am proposing Basin Groups for deletion because it is not a geologic era of the Moon that is recognized by experts who work in this field. The geological timescale that is currently in use is discussed at lunar geologic timescale, where there is no refernce to a "Basin Groups". The two external links for lunar geologic timescale do not have any reference to this era either. Wilhelms' book (which is considered a major repsected work by the lunar community) does not discuss this era (it is not in the index terms), nor does the popular article (written by a lunar scientist) of Linda Martel. On the Basin Groups article, there are two external links that have been used to support the case for such a group, but neither are reputable nor verifiable. One page says that information will be uploaded later, whereas the other is a wiki, and I have removed the offending material! As someone who works with the Moon on a daily basis, I could add a number of primary and secondary references supporting my assertions here, though I think that the Wilhelms and Martel articles should suffice. I would be happy to add additional refernces if asked. It is quite possible that Basin Groups was at one time used as an informal term (though I have never encountered it), and if this were the case, we could discuss this at lunar geologic timescale. Lunokhod 10:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per nom, and redirect if any evidence of currency is ever produced. 90-odd unique Googles, of whihc many are clearly unrelated. Cite papers if you want the redirect, I think. Guy (Help!) 12:51, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep Look at GeoWhen database a reasonably respected electronic resource. It would appear that the Basin Groups Stage is not in conflict with the existing lunar geologic timescale as discussed in the Wikipedia. The Basin Groups appears as a refinement, namely a subdivision of Pre-Nectarian time, equivalent to Late Pre-Nectarian. As the Pre-Nectarian article indicates this was a time of basin formation on Luna. I note that the Wikipedia lunar geologic timescale article also does not reflect the Cryptic Stage, Cryptic era, that covers the earlier portion of Pre-Nectarian time. As far as authoritative, I understand that the International Commission on Stratigraphy has not officially recognized any of the subdivisions of Hadean time. Also take a look at Harland, Walter Brian , et al. (1989) A Geologic Time Scale 1989 Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, Fig. 1.7 on page 10, available from Google books, which clearly shows both Basin Groups and Cryptic. --Bejnar 01:21, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

GeoWhen is not a reputable source. It is self-published. This is clear on the introduction of the web site, which says "Welcome to the GeoWhen Database, an attempt to sort out the mess that man has made of the geologic timescale. This project aims to reconcile the international stratigraphic standards with many of the regional and archaic naming schemes that appear in the literature." Lunokhod 10:32, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Concerning the Harland book, I will look this up in my library asap, as the online version of the book is only partial, and says nothing about the rationale for using these eras. In any case, none of my geology or planetary geology textbooks use these eras, and I can not find reference to this in my file cabinet of scientific articles or pdfs either. As an active scientist in this domain, I can honestly say that these eras are not used by even a minority of the terrestrial and planetary communities. (Again, if you want a list of books and reveiw articles, tell me.) I also point out that it is scientifically unsound to "paste" geologic eras from the Moon (or any other celestial body) into the Earth's geologic history. Lunokhod 11:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Reputable sources summarizing the geologic timescale of the Earth and Moon that do not mention Basin Groups

Book chapters

Ryder et al. "Heavy bombardment of the Earth at ~3.85 Ga" in Origin of the Earth and Moon (2000).
Hartmann et al., The time dependend intense bombardment of the primordial Earth/Moon system, ibid.
Hiesinger and Head, New views of lunar geoscience: an introduction and overview, in New views of the Moon (2006).
Horz et al., Lunar surface processes, in The lunar sourcebook, 1991.
Stoffler and Ryder, Stratigraphy and isotope ages of lunar geologic units: Chronological standard for the inner solar system, in Geochronology of Mars and inner solar system, 2001.

Books

The planetary scientists companion, Lodders and Fegley, 1998.
Planetary science: A lunar perspective, S. R. Taylor, 1982.
Moons and planets, W. K. Hartmann, 1993.
The geology of multi-ring basins, P. Spudis, 1993.
The geologic history of the Moon, D. Wilhelms, 1987.

Organizations

Geological Society of America
United Stated Geological Survey
International Commission on Stratigraphy —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lunokhod (talk • contribs) 22:53, 16 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Reputable sources summarizing the geologic timescale of the Earth and Moon that mention Basin Groups

Harland, Walter Brian , et al. (1989) A Geologic Time Scale 1989 Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

Delete. One mention in one book is not enough.--JyriL ^talk 14:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Harland et al. (1989) was basically the bible of geochronology for most geologists for more than a decade (until ICS 2004, and not withstanding the significant contributions of Gradstein, Ogg and Haq in the late 90s). If it is in that timescale, then it is worthy of mention. There is nothing wrong with saying that the terminology is uncommon or archaic in the article, and it certainly isn't part of the current ICS timescale, but those things by themselves do not justify simply pretending the terminology never existed. Keep the reference and explain the history for the reader. Also, "basin groups" hadean gives me 900 relevant google hits, not 90 as claimed above. 128.32.95.83 22:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have nothing against metioning this in either lunar geologic time scale or geologic time scale. This here is a debate only concering the deletion of the article Basin Groups, nothing else. Lunokhod 22:27, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Seems to me that outcome would be better served by a merge than a delete, if it goes that way. Bryan 01:56, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Non-mainstream concept. WP:FRINGE appears to discourage this type of article. If this term exists due to an actual controversy in the field that could be carefully documented, it might be worth keeping on that basis. As it is, the article is quite vague about why this is an unofficial term. (A proposal that was considered but rejected, or a proposal too innovative for the regular geologists, or what?). It doesn't even explain what 'basin' has to do with anything. EdJohnston 21:55, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

KEEP! GeoWhen is a reputable source. Whether GeoWhen is reputable or not is irrelevant for the "reputability" of Basin Groups. Whether Basin Groups is an official selenochron (or "reputable") is irrelevant. If it is a scientific term used sometimes, the article should be kept. If it's not a geochron, it should not be used in geochron templates, but the article can be kept. If it's not a selenochron it should not be used in selenochron templates, but the article can be kept. It's a very very odd conclusion, that since it's not an official part of this-or-that time sequence, it can be removed - it can most definitely not be removed, whether we like to use it or not. It would be a very bad thing if it be removed. The term is used, and therefore it should be kept. Regarding one of the "reputable" sources mentioned as not mentioning basin groups – Geologic History of the Moon, Don Wilhelms – it mentions basin groups at Plate 6A (page 11 in a PDF viewer), bottom of the page – not as selenochrons, but as deposit layers. It occurs – therefore it's a scientific necessity to keep the article. QED. Don't delete it – rewrite it!! Rursus 16:37, 20 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Amendment to AfD nomination: Figure of Harland et al. is inconsistent with their discussion in text. I have just read the Harland et al. book and have discovered the following: In the text, they advocate using the lunar geologic time scale for the Hadean which includes the Imbrian, Nectarian, and Pre-Nectarian. Then they cite Wilhemls (1987) to subdivide the Pre-Nectarian into Cryptic, Basin Group 1, and Basin Groups 2-9. However, in their figure, they do not include the Pre-Nectarian epoch, but instead only include the subdivisions. Based on their text, I can only conclude that this is a typo in their manuscript. Anyone who has cited their typo (fortunately, there are very few!) have simply propogated a typographical error.

Concerning the subdividing the Pre-Nectarian into "Basin Groups", it appears that Wilhelms did indeed suggest this. However, this is only informal, and none of the USGS geologic maps of the Moon use this notation. Indeed, from Wilhelms (1987,p. 145) he states: "This volume divides 30 pre-Necarian basins into 9 age groups (table 8.2). Each group is headed by one basin whose relative age seems to be well established by crater densities or superpositional relations. Additional basins are tentatively placed in the groups on weaker grounds."

I continue to support the nomination for deletion on the grouds that "Basin Groups 1-9 and Cryptic" should be replaced by "Pre-Necarian" based on the Harland et al.'s own words. The fact that these subdivisions were used instead of Pre-Nectarian appears to be a typo. Lunokhod 17:05, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Even if everything you say is correct, I continue to believe that the terms and their history deserve a place to be discussed, and that keeping the article for that purpose makes sense. At the least the content should be merged, not deleted. 128.32.95.83 17:13, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delete checking out the "huge" number of Google hits, most are due to wikipedia, and the rest are non authoritative entries. Google scholar comes up with nothing. The content could be relegated to a comment in Hadean article. (Really I dislike deleting stuff but this is misleading as to its reality. GB 22:40, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This discussion has been added as a test case to the proposed guideline Wikipedia:Notability (science). trialsanderrors 07:48, 19 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Withdrawl of AfD nomination: After talking to a few terrestrial geologists offline, I am going to withdraw my nomination for deleting "Basin Groups" for the following reasons: First, it appears that the Harland et al. book is so respected, that even if they did make a typo in their summary plot, or even if they did not understand the lunar geologic time scale and made an serious error in representing it, it doesn't matter, and its too late. Second, I consider the inclusion of this period in the terrestrial geologic time scale to be a case of bad science, and wikipedia can play a role in correcting this by presenting the mainstream view among terrestrial and planetary scientists for why this period should be abandonned. Lunokhod 15:23, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Good! I love You Lunokhod! This indicates Your intentions and Your attitude was motivated by a love of truth and science. That's a good example for the rest of us. Rursus 16:28, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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.