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 redirect to Gerontology. Jujutacular (talk) 05:07, 6 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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Extreme longevity tracking (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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There is no pin citations but nothing here that couldn't be merged into gerontology. Ricky81682 (talk) 22:03, 22 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Shields up, Mr. Chekov! All hands, brace for sockpuppets! EEng (talk) 23:32, 22 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@EEng: We may have lucked out but can you offer an opinion on the actual AFD before the week ends? -- Ricky81682 (talk) 19:50, 27 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Medicine-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:36, 26 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:36, 26 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Social science-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:36, 26 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep There are plenty of sources for this article and I believe that some of the previously deleted content should be restored since it doesn't really make any sense to delete an entire field of research that predates the term "gerontology" by three decades. 930310 (talk) 22:27, 27 August 2015 (UTC) — 930310 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
• Delete/merge to Gerontology or Demography or Longevity. In an abundance of disclosure, I should point out that the article took its current form after I took the knife to it a few months ago (starting here [1]) to remove unreferenced material (much of which probably shouldn't be included even if it had references) and fancruft. After that there's almost nothing left. While certainly many disciplines are interested in good data on lifespans (and those with long ones), this article tries to make it sound like checking people's ages is an extensive discipline with its own literature, which it isn't. The best proof of that is that there was an editor here, now blocked, who certainly would have added cites to such literature if it existed. EEng (talk) 23:14, 27 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I correct my own statement above re "best proof". The actual best proof that there's no such recognized field is Fiskje88's statement below that the phrase Extreme longevity tracking was made up by WP editors because this "recognized field" doesn't have a name. EEng (talk) 17:37, 1 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep and improve It's fair to say that some of the prior material was indeed "fancruft", but not the material on the field of research itself. This is a field which has been in existence for at least 140 years (William Thoms establishing the basic premise of the need for age verification in the 1870s). Plenty of sources exist and the article can be expanded, which I will. And although this is arguably a "sub-field", Wikipedia can have articles on sub-fields. -- Ollie231213 (talk) 00:57, 28 August 2015 (UTC) — Ollie231213 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

That someone wrote a book 140 years ago on the problems of verifying ages doesn't make that a field, any more than Galton writing about intelligence [2] made that a field (or at least a notable one). What makes it a notable field is people talking about about it as a field. Where are those sources? EEng (talk) 01:49, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

There is more than one book to cover this area as a field; in fact, William Thom's (the writer of the 140-year-old book) proposals were adopted by the Institute of Actuaries (based in London) in the 1890s, led by Thomas Emley Young at the time. This same Mr. Young wrote another book on the topic, which inspired others to continue writing about the topic for many more decades to come; even the New York Times covered this topic in 1909 [3], as evidenced by one of the sources in what has been left of the original Wikipedia entry [4]. Lastly, the existence of science conferences on the topic of extreme longevity tracking, such as [5], proves that the area of extreme longevity tracking certainly is a sub-field within demography (sharing overlap with the field of gerontology), instead of just a hobby. Fiskje88 (talk) 21:09, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Longevity (how old people get) is a notable topic, but the question here is whether verifying how old a given individual is is a distinct, notable subject. The subject of Young's book is longevity; he naturally debunks famous frauds and emphasizes the importance of skepticism, but that's not the subject of the book. The scientific conference whose program you link is the "10th Supercentenarian Conference"; it's about old people and how old they get, not the activity of figuring out how old they are (though of course there are items on the program related to that). The NYT piece is about trends in longevity, and mentions recent improvements in the quality of longevity statistics, but it's about longevity, not the process of keeping track of who's really old. EEng (talk) 21:54, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep and improve The extreme longeivty tracking is an interesting field of science, that may interest many Wikipedia users. There are plenty of international organizations, that study the phenomena, International Database on Longevity, Gerontology Research Group, Guinness World Records and other. Also, it can easily be learned from the article's history, that it has been severly affected by destructive edits done by user EEng, who now strongly approves the deletion/merging of the article. That is a proof in itself, that the user's edits were not justified and the user himself never acted in good faith. We must oppose the individual bias and work together to improve the stand alone article. There are many sources, which refer to scientific papers. Considering this, I am more than certain, that the article can be improved. Of course, it should be kept as stand-alone article. White Eaglet (talk) 09:06, 28 August 2015 (UTC) — White Eaglet (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
• Keep and improve Admittedly the article wasn't properly sourced in the past, yet there are enough reliable sources of note - see my additions and suggestions earlier in this discussion, for instance - to improve the Wikipedia entry and justify its existence. Fiskje88 (talk) 18:46, 28 August 2015 (UTC) — Fiskje88 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
• Delete/merge to Longevity or Gerontology as this is clearly a subset of these areas and not a discipline in and of itself. There's nothing here to this subject beyond "recording the ages of the very old is part of studying population demographics. Validating the ages of the very old by verifying birth and death dates is important in record-keeping and studies because people lie about their age, and validating hard to do because most countries didn't have mandatory birth records until fairly recently." If this was a recognised field of study it would make sense to have its own article but since it isn't and there's next to nothing there, it's better included as part of another article (perhaps replacing Longevity#Long-lived_individuals?) Ca2james (talk) 20:01, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep and improve I suggest to improve this article. A lot of content have been deleted and/or changed over time and is not up to date.Petervermaelen (talk) 10:27, 29 August 2015 (UTC) — Petervermaelen (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

• Keep and improve As Petervermaelen said above, a large amount of information has been removed from the article prior to this AfD being created. There are also various, reliable sources that can be added to this article, which in turn will lead to the expansion of the article. An example of a detailed, reliable source that can be added is this article [6] Bodgey5 (talk) 16:11, 30 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

That article is a profile of the GRG, which helps establish the notability of that organisation. It does not, however, discuss the field of Extreme Longevity Tracking and therefore does not establish its notability. Ca2james (talk) 05:55, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment Several keep !votes are calling for expanding the article. I looked but couldn't find reliable sources showing that the subject of the article is notable, let alone that the article could be expanded. Could someone please point me to the sources that establish notability of the article subject and can expand the article? Thanks. Ca2james (talk) 05:55, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• This is typical with WP:SPA like that. They support keep and then never return to provide the sources. Saying that sources could be found is a very, very poor rationale to support keeping an article. I hope the closer evaluates the discussion as such and if someone in the future does provide the sources, they can always create a new draft article. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 06:14, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Although I see your point, I don't necessarily agree with it. (No, this is not a "typical SPA" answer. Read on! ;) ) The point is that extreme longevity tracking is notable as it is apparent in other fields of research as well and has been notable and "in business" for the past 140 years; should this article be deleted or merged, it would be a shame if the material deleted by EEng were gone. In 1919, for instance, Alexander Graham Bell - notable not only within the field of longevity, thereby showing that even notable people performed research in this area - had this article [7] published. Bell, in fact, had a "Genealogical Research Office" in Washington D.C., where people could register claims of longevity to be researched by the office. On top of that, the presence of researchers such as Bell and Thom proves that there is a multidisciplinary overlap for this field of research. Seeing that there is multidisciplinary overlap within the field as well as a need for scientific research in 1919 already shows to me that extreme longevity tracking is, in itself, notable and in my view establishes its notability. What would your definition of notability be?

Moreover, I would like to add that extreme longevity tracking/research is more than a simple "check of the documents"; there are, among others, also issues of sourcing, data completeness, demographic impact, results analysis, life span issues, and DNA testing. All of this research has continued to be a topic of study, with literature about it being produced on a steady basis. A simple google entry comes up with articles such as [8] (showing overlap with the field of biology), [9] (proving extreme longevity tracking is not a sub-domain of the GRG), and [10] (showing that research within the field of extreme longevity tracking is also described in journals and scientific articles). Fiskje88 (talk) 17:37, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Each of those sources discuss longevity which indicate that it is a notable subject but not one of them say anything about Extreme Longevity Tracking. Therefore, they cannot be used to indicate the notability of extreme longevity tracking and do not support your claim that the subject is notable. Ca2james (talk) 18:59, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I like that one of the offered sources is entitled, "New Study Finds Extreme Longevity in White Sharks". Talk about straining! EEng (talk) 19:07, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Straining is restricted to whale sharks, basking sharks and megamouth sharks (that's a real shark species apparently; not some schlok horror film title); this shark, swallow ya whole. Little shakin', little tenderizin', down you go. Belle (talk) 16:26, 3 September 2015 (UTC) [reply]

Watch it or I'll Belle the cat again. EEng (talk) 02:00, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I see that you are seeking to find proof of the term 'Extreme Longevity Tracking' literally being used in articles/sources, yet please note that 'Extreme Longevity Tracking' was a compromise coined by Wikipedia editors as a name for this article; as a result, you won't find the exact same term in a plethora of sources - which doesn't mean that the field does not exist. Fiskje88 (talk) 16:57, 1 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, it actually does mean it doesn't exist. Recognized fields have names, so they can be... recognized. EEng (talk) 17:37, 1 September 2015 (UTC)g[reply]

• Ah, I see. The name was a compromise that cannot be found in a plethora of sources. That explains a lot. --Randykitty (talk) 17:30, 1 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Point taken, I concede that I was too vague in my wording. Allow me to rephrase. As one can see from the edit history of the original article, see [11], and from the talk page of the article, see [12], one can see that the current name for the article, "extreme longevity tracking", was made by Wikipedia administrators (including Carcharoth) in 2007. As it combined the terms "supercentenarian tracking", which was used in European settings such as the Max Planck Institute, the phrase "extreme longevity" (as used in articles quoted elsewhere in this discussion) and "extreme longevity research," the title cannot be an example of WP:OR. On top of that, a phrase such as "validation of age extreme age claims", which ties in with this topic, was in existence even before Wikipedia existed and continues to be used in scholarly articles, as evidenced by - for example - [13]. As such, I do feel that the history of this field should be preserved somewhere on Wikipedia, (read this closely!) be it in either a standalone article OR a sub-article (known as a 'merge' over here). Should the vote ultimately go to 'merge', then Longevity would be the correct field for this article to be placed in, as some do not seem to understand that extreme longevity tracking is trying to scientifically determine the maximum human lifespan (which is not similar to documenting supercentenarians). Moreover, an article proving that there is a sub-field of research on supercentenarians would be [14], for instance. On top of that, the article is proof that there are organisations outside the GRG - in this case the IDL - which focus on the issue of extreme longevity tracking. Should you wish to have more proof of sources documenting extreme longevity research, please let me know. I'd be more than happy to provide them. :) Fiskje88 (talk) 18:41, 2 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"extreme longevity tracking is trying to scientifically determine the maximum human lifespan" -- ridiculous, since passively if obsessively recording people's ages at death takes no account of the effect of medical advances and environmental changes, which obviously are critical. Research on longevity and gerontology grapples with extremely complex factors and interventions; longevity "tracking" is nothing more than fussy recordkeeping with nonsense emphasis on "champions", "incumbents", and "successors" who persevered a few weeks longer than the "runners up". There is absolutely no scientific value to these ultra-extremes. EEng (talk) 22:41, 2 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I am disappointed to read your comment, EEng; I am trying to have a reasonable discussion here - note the word discussion, not even a positive vote for 'keep' - yet I have the feeling that your (seemingly biased?) mind had already been made up before this thread was started and that there is not even a chance at a fair discussion. If you throw in comments such as "longevity 'tracking' is nothing more than fussy recordkeeping with nonsense emphasis on 'champions', 'incumbents', and 'successors' who persevered a few weeks longer than the 'runners up'[,]" then you haven't even taken the trouble to take a fair look at all of the sources I have provided - nor do you even remotely grasp what longevity tracking is about. Longevity tracking is not done by "fans" who care about champions or successors; on the contrary, it is done by scientists trying to determine what factors enable or disable people from reaching their full potential. These scientists try to establish why people, on average, live longer now than they lived thirty years ago - or even a hundred years ago; compare the amount of verified, living 110+-year-olds today to the amount of living verified 110+-year-olds in 1915. Finding scientific evidence for the (seemingly) prolonged longevity of human beings is also what scientists publish about: [15] shows that Mrs. Van Andel-Schipper's blood proved that there is a limit to human life; [16] shows that in 2014 Mrs. Leutscher-de Vries' brains would be examined to research why some of the elderly do not develop dementia, whereas [17] is actively campaining to get 100+-year-olds not suffering from dementia to participate in dementia-research; lastly, [18] and [19] show that scientists try to uncover why people live longer in the so-called 'blue zones' - clearly research interested in environmental issues, not 'champions' or 'successors'. With all of this material and its scientific sources freely and publicly available, what could possibly make some people replying here still so easily, and in such a biased and blunt manner, brush off longevity tracking as yet another aspect of 'fancrufting'? Fiskje88 (talk) 17:41, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The article on Mrs. VAS says that her autopsy "suggests" something, that "it seemed" such-and-such, and that Scientist X asks "Does that imply that there’s a limit to human life? Or can you get round that by [doing whatever]?” That from this you conclude that the article "proved that there is a limit to human life" is characteristic of the fuzzy thinking the imbues the WOP project.

Everything you're talking about comes under the subjects of longevity and gerontology. Insisting that there's something else called "extreme longevity tracking" is like saying that, in addition to the article Human height, there ought to be one called Measuring the heights of really tall people. It's stupid. EEng (talk) 21:48, 3 September 2015 (UTC) I notice that every page of the "bluezones" article you link [20] says, "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.". Is that some kind of Supercentenarianspeak? Can you translate for us?[reply]

That would be Lorem ipsum text at a different starting point and rearranged a bit. Every one of those sources above shows the notability of Gerontology and Longevity as fields of study. They say nothing about the notability of extreme longevity tracking. It seems that longevity fans think that if longevity is notable, then longevity tracking must also be notable but this is not the case. Each field must be independently notable, and every single one of these links above has very clearly shown that extreme longevity tracking isn't notable in the slightest. Ca2james (talk) 00:31, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, it's Loren Ipsum, is it? I didn't realize. I think I knew him in high school. EEng (talk) 02:00, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Ca2james, I appreciate your reply - I actually think the both of us somewhat agree, as you do argue that the sources provided should be reflected in an article *somewhere* on Wikipedia. Remember that a 'delete/merge' could also mean that all of the content of the original article would be deleted, and that's what I am trying to prevent. However, what I do not agree with is that "extreme longevity tracking isn't notable in the slightest" - that is a meiotic redundancy of all of the research done within the field. Let's agree to disagree. Fiskje88 (talk) 12:31, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Then, as an afterthought... EEng, I realise that the "fight" WOP-members are putting up must, at times, be frustrating for you (I even agree with you that some of the pages in the WOP project are completely unnecessary or much too extensive, surprise surprise!) - yet the way you react to and comment on us is uncalled for. Your demeaning terms to describe WOP members ("fuzzy thinking that imbues the WOP project", to mention the latest in a series of insults) and the strong language you use in your rationale ("ridiculous", as your last example, or how about the amount of sarcasm/cynicism in your posts) give me the impression that you are trying to bully your way through; you seem to forget that you are 'talking' to other real/live people who deserve more than being treated the way they are by you. As a grown-up, human being you must realise that you wouldn't want to be treated as such either. Once more, I definitely realise that, occasionally, we must be a frustrating bunch of (insert-strong-term-here) for you - yet that does not mean you can belittle us the way you are doing at times. It saddens me, as it makes me realise that Wikipedia is not what I thought it was: a community in which people can rationally hold a discussion with each other. Just my two cents. :) Fiskje88 (talk) 12:53, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete/Merge as proposed by EEng and Ca2james. Nothing puts this "field" apart from the main field of gerontology. --Randykitty (talk) 08:38, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/merge to Gerontology or Demography or Longevity. BMK (talk) 08:44, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/Redirect or selective Merge to gerontology and demography or longevity as appropriate. Basically what most others are saying above. Not enough sources to establish it as a notable field in its own right. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 18:23, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete and Merge selectively into Gerontology and Longevity, as appropriate. There's nothing special here to justify extreme longevity tracking as a separate article. It's not how a user would look for this information. David in DC (talk) 21:05, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/Merge per others above. The points made so far seem to indicate this isn't notable as a standalone article. Kingofaces43 (talk) 03:54, 1 September 2015 (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.