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Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tau (mathematics)

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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. An interesting discussion, with a few different points of intersection. First, the keeps have the better of it from a notability standpoint. The original nomination specifically addressed sourcing, and invoked the GNG; this was adequately rebutted, and a number of the comments acknowledged explicitly or tacitly the nontrivial coverage. Thus, the administrative action here is to close the discussion as keep. However, I see a strong consensus that the article should be renamed or merged somewhere, and given the degree of participation here I am prepared to call this a local consensus to the effect that, while notable, the topic is best addressed within another article. This well within editorial discretion, however, I do not see agreement as to a merge target. So, I am making an simple editorial decision (which anyone should feel free to revert) to move the article to Tau (2π), and there is absolutely no prejudice to further move or merge discussions. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 02:32, 8 July 2011 (UTC) N. B. Almost forgot about the redirect. Several argued against it existing, and the only argument in favor was for attribution purposes. That's not at issue since the article was kept, so I will delete the redirect from Tau (mathematics). NEVERMIND. Runningonbrains (talk · contribs) simply retargeted the redirect, a more elegant solution to which I defer. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 02:40, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tau (mathematics)

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Tau (mathematics) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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The only source that this article cites (and it doesn't even acutally cite it) is a self-published source by a single mathematician. It fails WP:GNG, and certainly isn't a reliable source. Inks.LWC (talk) 18:43, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. —Inks.LWC (talk) 18:49, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. This is a non-notable use of the term in mathematics, basically the effort of a single educator that, for some reason, has been picked up by a few mainstream media outlets. In the extremely unlikely event that thus notion produces a lasting scientific impact as evidenced by its use in peer reviewed scholarly sources, the article can always be spun out afresh. There are, at any rate, much more established uses of the symbol tau in mathematics (in the theory of elliptic curves, for instance) that the present article's focus is assigning grossly inappropriate weight to a thoroughly marginal usage. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:23, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Possibly move somewhere. I agree with Sławek that the current title is bad because too many things in mathematics are called τ and this one is probably not in the top fifty. Just the same, the proposal to work with 2π instead of π has received enough coverage that it may be "notable" in our WP-specific sense of the word. It's kind of marginal, and I wouldn't like to see an article that pulls together independent proposals and makes a commonality out of them, unless some secondary source has already done so. --Trovatore (talk) 19:42, 29 June 2011 (UTC) (Striking out so as to give a more explicit !vote below — I stand by everything I said here, I just have a clearer idea what I think should be done)[reply]
  • Keep. The la template above yields unfair results, since it looks explicitly for "Tau (mathematics)" a term unlikely to be used. Here's some other sources (found with a fair google search) math-blog.com, newscientist.com, physorg.com. The fact that dust has been thrown up, means that the concept was deemed noteworthy by other (news)organisations, and quite a few, too. Besides... It's just a damn good idea and simplifies quite a number of things. Other symbols, such as e and π, have multiple meanings too. Kleuske (talk) 19:54, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete, per nom. Possibly move without redirect to τ (π), if it's sufficiently notable. (And, has been pointed out in the talk pages for this article and for pi, it's not a particularly good idea, it simplifies some formulas, and complicates others.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:12, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    It's clear that any article at this name is misleading, except as a redirect to Tau#Mathematics, hence it should either be deleted or moved without redirect, before any merging is done. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:55, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    Reasonable targets include Tau (π), Tau (2π), or just 2π (which would allow discussion of the 3-legged π, basically moving most of Pi#Criticism to the new article). Tau (mathematical ''whatever'') is not good. I don't really like Tau (pi), Tau (2 pi) or 2 pi. However, as I noted below, "move without redirect" is not a "keep". I don't presently have a non-admin autoconfirmed account to check, but I think it requires an Admin to do that, and it used to be "move and delete redirect". — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:51, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Meta-comment Let's please not get distracted talking about whether it's a good idea or not. That has no bearing on our decision; we cover (or don't cover) good ideas and bad ideas according to the same criteria. --Trovatore (talk) 20:39, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: in addition to the sources mentioned by Kleuske, here are a few other examples: [1], [2], [3]. Scog (talk) 20:51, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
None of which are reliable sources for determining usage in mathematics. Sławomir Biały (talk) 20:55, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
They do however show notability quite nicely. And wikipedia is not a maths-only encyclopedia, if i'm not very much mistaken. Kleuske (talk) 17:03, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Of course. But the title of the article is tau (mathematics) (emphasis mine), meaning that we should look for sources that indicate how the symbol τ is used in mathematics. As I and others have already pointed out elsewhere, this usage is quite marginal in mathematics. In fact, as far as I'm aware no mathematical sources even use this notation for 2π. If you want, you can move the article to campaign to rename the fundamental constant 2π to τ, but my argument is that this article, with this title should be deleted. I.e., tau (mathematics) should be a redlink. Sławomir Biały (talk) 00:18, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The title is what i came up with and i don't claim to be knowledgable on current en.wiki nomenclature conventions with respect to mathematical subjects. So shoot me for that mistake, if you must, but don't take it out on the article. The name is easy to change. Kleuske (talk) 15:08, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep enough news coverage, we even had Marcus du Sautoy talking about it on prime time Radio4 broadcast, article. --Salix (talk): 21:01, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • pi#Criticism seems to be the natural place for discussion on this topic, and there is adequate coverage there. Tau already has a link to that section so readers will be be able the material, and no need for a seperate page, hence delete.--Salix (talk): 06:47, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOTNEWS and wait a year to see if anyone even remembers this after that time. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:26, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete − per WP:NOT#NEWS and WP:TOOSOON. The impact of the subject is not proven. There was a news furry for a single day, but that has already gone away. — Fly by Night (talk) 22:31, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I thought this had been around for a few years, but maybe I'm wrong. I've heard of it from multiple independent sources, some of them not people who usually pay any attention to mathematics, so I'm slightly inclined to say keep (but maybe review the matter in a couple of years?). Michael Hardy (talk) 22:41, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • From what I had read, the τ manifesto was only published on March 14 of this year. Also, we need to look at the bigger picture. If this article stays then it sets a president. People will be updating all of our articles with τ. We've already seen some WP:POINTy edits going on. — Fly by Night (talk) 22:58, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • I'm quite sure I've heard about a movement to change from pi to 2pi as the fundamental constant before this year. I've seen both tau and another symbol used for this constant, where the other was a three-legged pi. (That might suggest a different page name, but not deletion.) CRGreathouse (t | c) 00:04, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • "The Tau Manifesto" has "Tau Day, 2010" as its publication date; also, in the interview in the New Scientist on the occasion of this year's Tau day, Hartl says: "In The Tau Manifesto, which I published last year, ..."[4].  --Lambiam 04:05, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Merge if not kept. Which article to merge this into could possibly get argued about. Most likely π, I think. Maybe a section listing the proposed advantages and crediting the proposer. Michael Hardy (talk) 21:28, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move without redirect to tau (twice pi) or something similarly unambiguous, then merge to pi#Criticism. The subject is notable enough to cover but I'm not sure it deserves a separate article. In any case it can't have the name tau (mathematics); that's just unreasonable. --Trovatore (talk) 23:33, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep per David Eppstein. Certainly it should be covered, probably in its own article, probably not at this title as Trovatore says. CRGreathouse (t | c) 00:04, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge to pi as described above by Trovatore. The title "tau (mathematics)" is misleading: if such a page exists, the content should be along the lines of Tau#Maths. Jowa fan (talk) 00:10, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - This topic is already covered by the main article Pi#Criticism. It is not notable enough to have a separate article. Lankdarhn (talk) 01:39, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete for lack of notability. If you were to hand me a τ and ask what mathematical symbol I thought it represented, I would probably guess time. I might guess the period length of a periodic function or maybe (as Sławomir Biały pointed out above) a point in the complex plane defining an elliptic curve. If you told me that it was supposed to represent some fundamental object, I think I would settle on Ramanujan's tau function. I would certainly not guess that it means 2π—that usage is obscure, and I expect that it'll be forgotten in a few years. Everything we ought to say about it is already at Pi#Criticism. Ozob (talk) 01:56, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, sufficient coverage to establish notability – for a few more sources see below this recommendation. The fact that the proposal has not resulted in a change of mathematical practice is not relevant for its notability.  --Lambiam 03:36, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Eoin O'Carroll (March 14, 2011). "Pi Day: Why we celebrate 3.14..." The Christian Science Monitor.
    • Elizabeth Landau (March 14, 2011). "La constante matemática pi tiene un rival: tau" (in Spanish). CNN México.
    • Michiel Hendryckx (June 30, 2011). "Weg met 3,14159265... ?". De Standaard (in Dutch).
    • Jacob Aron (January 8, 2011). "Michael Hartl: It's time to kill off pi". The New Scientist. 209 (2794): 23. doi:10.1016/S0262-4079(11)60036-5.
  • Comment how about moving it to 2π, and generalizing it to cover all proposals to replace (π) with (2π) Like τ and the three-legged-pi, etc. 65.94.47.63 (talk) 05:14, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move without redirect to tau (2π), then redirect to pi#Criticism as suggested by Trovatore. And yes, it is definitely notable, significant news coverage was not only in the U.S. but basically all over the world! Nageh (talk) 05:55, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
tau (mathematical constant) doesn't really make me happy either, after all, it is not an established mathematical constant. A redirect via tau (2π) seems sensible so a search for a specific tau may at least pop up in the search box. Otherwise, we've already got two disambiguation pages (tau and tau (disambiguation)) that both point to the usage of tau as 2pi. Nageh (talk) 07:24, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If you think it is already there at turn (geometry) (and you think that it does belong there), then why would you want to retain an insensible redirect? Nageh (talk) 14:11, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Merge means merge, in other words take the useful material in the article and copy it to the other article. There is already a section ("Mathematical constant") that talks about tau being used as a unit. I think the redirect makes sense; don't assume someone reading about tau as a unit will know it means turn. The media coverage makes it notable (media coverage is often capricious that way), but notability does not mean you should create content forks for every possible name.--RDBury (talk) 14:57, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have an issue with the name. If I look up an article entitled tau (mathematics) I expect this to be an exposee about the usage of the symbol tau in mathematics in general, and not only for such a niche. Nageh (talk) 21:34, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I see your point. We already have Tau (disambiguation) so I agree it's superfluous to have a redirect also.--RDBury (talk) 02:16, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment for me there's no real question that the proposal to use a symbol for 2π instead of π is notable. The questions are, does it deserve a whole article, and if so, what should that article be called? I think the name tau (mathematics) is utterly unjustified. --Trovatore (talk) 16:41, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with your take (though I slightly favor keeping the article). Ramanujan's tau would be more appropriate under that name. CRGreathouse (t | c) 18:06, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The current title is due to my ignorance of proper nomenclature. I'm happy with any alternative deemed appropriate. Kleuske (talk) 19:09, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
@Hullaballoo: On an irrelevant note, seems a much better argument *for* than against—instead of connecting five fundamental constants it connects six, and the n-th roots of unity don't include a 2 for no apparent reason. If you're going to argue against at least give one of the better reasons. :)
Not that I feel strongly one way or the other—personally I use not the other symbol.
CRGreathouse (t | c) 18:06, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There is not enough notable to say to keep an entire article. But maybe you should start coming up with a more suitable name? Maybe tau (2π)? I could live with that (as a redirect, that is). (For "tau" in "mathematics", we already have two disambiguation pages at tau and tau (disambiguation).) Nageh (talk) 08:36, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
An Afd is not the place to sort out a new name. If you could live with tau (2π) (which strikes me as a good idea, BTW) then that is a Keep. -- cheers, Michael C. Price talk 10:11, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep This has been around for ten years now, and has recently been covered by New Scientist and BBC Radio 4 (and that's just in the UK). Those alone are enough to demonstraate WP:N - end of story. We don't need articles for both Michael Hartl and Tau, but we should cover this issue, under at least one of those name, with a redirect from the other. Mathematicians who think it's a nonsense are simply irrelevant - the point is that the campaign exists and is notable, not whether it's right or wrong. As a physicist more than a mathematician, it also make a lot of sense from my viewpoint. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:24, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral for right now, but there are multiple issues on the article that I wrote briefly on its talk page. Depending on whether or not those issues are resolved, I may change my vote. --RAN1 (talk) 20:35, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Added half an hour after the article was sabotaged (i.e. rewritten as a bad essay) by a conveniently passing anon. I have REAL trouble maintaining WP:AGF with respect to these actions. All the points added by RAN1 were eliminated or did not exist in the first place (e.g. recentism). Kleuske (talk) 09:26, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The anon isn't the issue, you should probably check my reply on the talk page. --RAN1 (talk) 18:20, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Change to delete, given what I said above, not enough reliable sources to satisfy WP:GNG. If kept, merge based on Trovatore's recommendation. --RAN1 (talk) 02:36, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect this page to Tau#Mathematics and....merge SOMEwhere There is only one thing I fully agree with: this page should redirect to the disambiguation page for Tau, because there are many other more notable uses of the Greek letter tau in mathematics. My first instinct was that this is not notable enough for its own article, due to this really just being a media blitz based on a fluff piece on a very small group of mathematicians. However, even if this is slightly just notable enough to have its own article, it doesn't make sense: this is a stub article, little more than a dictionary definition with a couple lines of justification. Furthermore, unless this becomes a real movement (probably not[citation needed]), this will never be more than the stub we have right now. This can easily be covered in the "Criticism" section of pi, and in fact, literally everything notable about this article is already contained there and at the main article linked from that section, which is turn (geometry). There is no reason to have a separate article for this one term when it is one of a few criticisms of the use of pi (which are voiced by a SMALL minority of mathematicians) which are all essentially along the same line. So a merge to pi really makes the most sense, and any additional information can be covered at turn (geometry).-RunningOnBrains(talk) 21:25, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment. Right idea, wrong order. I think we agree that the existing search term, tau (mathematics), should not be a redirect to the 2π thing. However the history of the current article should stay with wherever the 2π material winds up, or with the redirect to that content.
    • So the bottom line is, the current article needs first to be moved to some unambiguous title, from which the material can be merged somewhere. That keeps the history in the right place. Then tau (mathematics) can be either deleted or retargeted to tau#Mathematics. --Trovatore (talk) 19:05, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge without redirect to Michael Hartl. Merging it to Pi or almost anywhere else would be undue weight and should be quickly deleted. Dingo1729 (talk) 05:28, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That's not very logical except when you consider Michael Hartl to be kept. (Which is unlikely to be the case.) Nageh (talk) 07:19, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You're right. I didn't look carefully, so I didn't realize Michael Hartl was likely to be deleted too. I sort of feel that the two articles together are just about notable and that they are closely connected. So I guess I'd like to merge them under a "Michael Hartl" title, taking care, as others have pointed out, to delete any unreasonable redirects. Dingo1729 (talk) 05:50, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge to Turn (geometry), which already covers this constant. The idea is a silly one, but notable, given the extensive media coverage, and the importance of pi. However, an article already exists. -- 202.124.73.166 (talk) 10:51, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment The problem with that is that it leaves a redirect to turn (geometry) from tau (mathematics), which we don't want. Nor can we just delete the redirect because that loses the history. So a move needs to happen first. Sorry for the broken record; I just think this is an important detail that people need to take into account. --Trovatore (talk) 19:07, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep strongly with a possible rename as suggested above for disambiguation. Apologies for my formatting ineptness. I'm lookig for instructions/norms so I get it right and can edit better later. - Firstly this is not a silly idea. Please don't confuse the style of Hartl's rhetoric with the message itself, being the logic of the idea and its social implications. This isn't actually strict mathematics, but rather a thoughtful socio-historical campaign about how we view established terms and constructs. A Mathermatical (Michel) Foucault, with a Californian levity, as it were. Ignore the style, there is substance here, and it's beyond mere mathematical description. - Secondly, therefore merging to Turn (geometry) is a Terrible idea, because it would confuse a page about how we currently perceive the maths of circle geometry, turns, with he ideas about how we may wish to challenge those terms. And thiis page is not in maths territory, but more in (Thomas) Kuhn and social criticism territory. And no less important for that. A link to this (renamed) page from Turn (geometry) would suffice. - Thirdly, I'm fairly sure the others above have lists of a large swathe of media and academic followers who find this idea more than mere whimsy. There is enough interest in it that it stay, and as more than a flash in the pan: think of your grandad who still likes to use inches and fahrenheit rather than SI units, and see how resistant he is to change. Well, those who see this as frivolous are in many ways analogous to that very understandable stance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.35.247.163 (talk) 18:46, 3 July 2011 (UTC) — 82.35.247.163 (talk) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
    • Whether or not any of us think it's a good idea is irrelevant to whether it should have an article here. Wikipedia is not the place to right things that people believe are wrong. We are here to decide whether the movement is notable enough to be covered in its own article. In my opinion it is not, but that's why we're having this discussion. -RunningOnBrains(talk) 23:54, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • Fair point Runningonbrains (the post you replied to was mine, not signed-in). To me, it appears to be notable enough, and I was merely cautioning against dismissing it as mere flippancy due to its rhetorical style. It's true that the data are quite recent, but not all new-ish things need be discarded: for example, new TV celebs get in here rather quickly. So many less-useful and less-long-lasting entries arrive in Wikipedia (often celeb bio details); this appears to have much longer-lasting potential influence. I suspect that if you're worried about numbers interested in this, if left for six or twelve months you'll find the diffusion S-curve steepens and numbers multiply exponentially. I advise caution, and waiting. Already academics as far from California as Leeds, are making youtube vids about it, (eg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF1zcRoOVN0) IMHO this doesn't happen to mere fly-by-night novelties. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Richardhod (talk • contribs) 03:24, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I fully support Trovatore's very clearly articulated proposal. Sławomir Biały (talk) 21:54, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure, I think that the difference is that a turn is an angle, whereas tau is just a number.Teapeat (talk) 10:37, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with Teapot for a different reason. Tau's page is not the same as the Turn article, because the reason for reading each page is different. One is to explain how turns in a circle work, the other is to explain how a naming convention is mathematical bad practice (occam) and aesthetically imprecise, and providing a solution. Different pages required. Richardhod (talk) 13:36, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Not so. Turn (geometry) is about the measure of angle called a "turn", which is equal to τ radians. Gandalf61 (talk) 13:53, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still not sure Gandalf, do you happen to know whether π is equal to 180 degrees, or is it only π radians?Teapeat (talk) 15:02, 5 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think the concern is that Wikipedia requires attribution, and merging without preserving the history would violate that. - SudoGhost™ 13:08, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Michael Hartl has been deleted, per its AfD. A merge there is, well, a delete. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:49, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • No, a merge there is moot. The people who wanted that did so on the assumption that that page would continue to exist, and we can't know what they would want now unless/until they tell us. ― A. di M.​plé​dréachtaí 13:16, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • Which is why merges are effectively keeps at an AFD. -- cheers, Michael C. Price talk 13:24, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        • Could you point us to the policy that says that, or is it just your opinion? For what it's worth, my opinion is that a Merge means that the content doesn't deserve its own article, but at the same time it shouldn't be deleted if possible. However, the merge target has been deleted. The merge !votes agree that the subject isn't worthy of an article, whilst suggesting a merge to an article which, via independent AfD, has been judged not to be worthy of an article. That's Wikipedia Limbo; which is very, very different to a keep !vote. — Fly by Night (talk) 00:30, 7 July 2011 (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.

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