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 Enter CambridgeBayWeather, waits for audience applause, not a sausage 01:22, 29 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Superoperator[edit]

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Note: I am good-faith submitting this for the IP below. Please see Talk:Superoperator, there is consensus for doubt about this page. Otherwise I have no opinion (and no knowledge). tedder (talk) 17:28, 21 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This deletion discussion is now three years old but the page still exists. Yes, this term is used in quantum information literature, but it is used in several different meanings. E.g. I think it is also used in the description of dissipative systems. There it denotes general linear mappings between operators. Imho, not having this page in wp is still better than misleading information. 85.127.20.219 (talk) 21:13, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Argh. Added deletion note, but cannot create the necessary discussion pages. What a shame. If anybody drops by, could he/she please add this (even if you're not convinced)? 85.127.20.219 (talk) 21:28, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - my reading of the discussion on the article's talk page was a consensus for keep, with no strong arguments for delete other than a suggestion that the term might not be as widely used as the article suggests (which is a cleanup/fact issue, not an AfD issue). - DustFormsWords (talk) 23:41, 21 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - Superoperator is a common concept in quantum mechanics, particularly quantum information theory. 100,000+ hits on google, 5000+ hits on google scholar. Ϙ (talk) 02:42, 22 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. —Phil Bridger (talk) 15:08, 22 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - (First, thanks to Tedder for helping me.) Already the second entry in google refers to the Liouville operator, which, interestingly, in wp is not called a superoperator. This might be due to the fact, that imho superoperator is ill defined (there is nothing `super' on a superoperator). Even worse I could imagine that superoperator is used in literature on supersymmetry. My reasoning for deletion is based on the following two points
- - Comment - A superoperator is an operator acting on a space of operators. The first sentence of the current article is correct and unambiguous. The prefix super- means above;over;beyond, not great or wonderful, so the name seems appropriate. (Not that that matters as far as WP is concerned.) Ϙ (talk) 19:33, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    - Reply - Yes. But it is just an operator. It is neither above, over, nor beyond anything (though it is a wonderful tool). I now think it would be nice to have an superoperator entry in WP, but make it a redirect to Operator, since it is just a special name for certain kinds of operators and it can be explained in one sentence. 85.127.39.141 (talk) 16:24, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- the term is used mainly in research articles --- does anyone know a textbook where a clear definition of `superoperator' occurs?
  - Comment - Quantum Computation and Quantum Information by Neilson and Chuang. But the first sentence of the current article is already a clear, textbook definition. Ϙ (talk) 19:33, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    - Reply: That can be considered as a convincing source as far as QI is concerned. However, I guess there it is defined as being a CP map. 85.127.39.141 (talk) 16:24, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- the current entry is misleading and the changes I have made are only acceptable as an intermediate step before complete deletion. I don't have enough knowledge in order to write even an acceptable stub. In this instance I think no entry is better than a misleading one (but maybe this opinion violates some wired wp guidline). 85.127.39.254 (talk) 07:32, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This should not be deleted but it should not remain as an article without references and without an expert to make sure it is correct. There is a dictionary def here which seems fairly close to the current state of the article. It does appear in other parts of wikipedia such as SIC-POVM#Superoperator, Internet Relay Chat services#Access levels (As Super-Operator), Quantum tomography#Quantum dynamical maps, Quantum programming#QFC and QPL. As it seems to have more than one meaning it could potentially be made into a disambig page. Polargeo (talk) 07:31, 27 October 2009 (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.