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.
Smartass comment What's the difference between "speculation that" and "allegations of"? (Yeah, yeah, WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS ...). Nothing valuable to add to this discussion except that this would probably be undue weight if it got merged back to Iapetus (moon); sourcing at present seems a bit week to keep it even at its present location. cab10:20, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. The nomination argument doesn't make any sense. An article about speculation is not the same as a speculative article. This article is not speculating, but (apparently) reporting facts about some people who speculated that Iapetus is artificial. That said, I'm not convinced that the speculation in question is notable enough for an article. --Itub11:03, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge & Delete but not for the reasons stated above. This is related more to the Moon landing then anything else. No matter what the evidence points at, some people claim it is a hoax. That article has a small paragraph explaining the claims, and a link to Apollo Moon Landing hoax accusations. The difference between the moon and this article is the amount of information the conspiracy theorists have published on the matter. As such, I don't feel this subject requires a seperate article at this time, but that may change in the future as it becomes a bit more notible and people start publishing their theories. Turlo Lomon12:29, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, non notable conspiracy theory. Already mentioned in Iapetus - a theory nobody takes seriously does not deserve an article. --Targeman 12:32, 7 August 2007 (UTC) PS. I've no idea where I saw the reference, hopefully a temporary eclipse of the brain :-) --Targeman13:18, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I'd say a joke theory might well merit an article if there were indeed coverage of the joke to a sufficient degree. Or there is the case of Category:Obsolete scientific theories where the theories were perhaps once taken seriously, but then refuted. In this case, I'm not sure there's enough coverage to merit an article on its own, but there is just barely enough to mention it. briefly. FrozenPurpleCube 21:31, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge with the moon's article. No real need for this to be separate. I just checked the moon article and I can't actually find any reference to Hoagland's theories except for a POV-described external link (POV removed). If there's a theory about Iapetus that is sourced, I see no reason for it not to be mentioned, but it doesn't need it's own article. 23skidoo12:47, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to Iapetus, if reliable independent sources can be provided to show that this is a view held by some non-trivial section of the population. Otherwise, just delete. -- Arthur Frayn12:59, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge A simple Google test on Donald Goldsmith and Tobias Owen indicates that their work is reputable and well published (if off the wall) - it's currently up to it's third edition. Not enough for an independent article IMHO but certainly worth covering in the main one. Pedro | Chat 14:08, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
DeleteMerge(edited) The speculation is based mostly on the website of Hoagland, who sees things in the photos by the Cassini probe that I do not see. I do not know what the book by Goldsmith and Tobias said in the 2nd edition but they have third edition (2001) of the book [1] with a supporting website which links to their "News from Saturn" [2]. There they attribute the special features of Iapetus to natural processes. The Goldsmith book (3rd ed, 2001) can be searched at Amazon, and on p 383 they say "Iapetus is "the only object in the solar system that we might seriously regard as an alien signpost, a natural object deliberately modified by an advanced civilization to attract our attention and encourage us to decipher its meaning" which is then tied to Arthur Clark's 2001 novel. This conjecture thus has sufficient support to mention in Wikipedia and the best place is in the article on Iapetus, whether the "owners" of that article want it there or not. It should not be a POV fork as it is at present. As a standalone article, much of the other article would have to be duplicated here to provide balance. Edison15:22, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Doesn't the title of the article scream WP:OR and WP:POV? <additional edit> Re-reading the article, the 2nd paragraph, which leads to a source, is documented by a known conspiracy theorist. Personally, I think it's WP:POV if a consipracy theorist is trying to claim a conspiracy on a specific subject...doesn't really count as a source IMO </additional edit> --sumnjimtalk with me·changes16:14, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: The 2 provided sources are the origination of the "theories". It doesn't appear that anyone has written about the theories. DCEdwards196618:15, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, as there does not appear to be any serious scientific interest in this notion. Anything that crank Hoagland publishes can be dismissed outright, and the fact that one other source says something to the effect of "Hey, if anything nearby were artificial, this is it" hardly constitutes a serious theory worth mentioning. If we want to be especially generous we can make very brief mention of this fact on Iapetus (moon), but we have to be careful not to lend this sort of thing undue weight. ɑʀкʏɑɴ19:15, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Minimal Merge The theory may be untrue, however, it does exist, and I see two news results [3] here. Also mentioned in a book here [4]. 0-5Rz0] Yes, it may be false, it may just be speculation, but since we can establish that there is speculation, then we can note whose speculation it is and without giving it undue weight, mention it to an appropriate degree. It would also be appropriate to add any refutations of that speculation. FrozenPurpleCube 21:24, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect/merge, is a tiny article. Main is not too long yet... can merge, if either become majorly long in the future they can be split apart again. MathmoTalk00:08, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge. I would not merge it with Iapetus's article; rather, I would merge it with Hoagland's. This is entirely Hoagland's idea, one of many, many equally insane ideas, and so should not be separated from him, any more than the planet Nibiru can be separated from Zecharia Sitchin. Serendipodous22:08, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge with Hoagland as per Serendipodous. Thsi stuff might have some relevance to the progenitor of the idea, but none to the astronomical object. Deuar12:33, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to Iapetus. Errant nonsense or not, what matters is whether there are suitable references about the idea. The idea may be crank, but the idea exists. Mere mention of the existence of this idea is not undue weight. The idea does not seem notable enough for its own article. --SmokeyJoe10:37, 13 August 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.