Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2014 April 17

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April 17[edit]

Category:American (x) philosophers[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: no consensus. The nominated categories may be presented again on a case by case basis. – Fayenatic London 17:06, 18 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: All three of these are in violation of final rung rule of WP:EGRS - the parent category cannot be fully diffused in other ways. Indeed, the parent currently has 981 articles. Accordingly, these categories will tend to ghettoize and the people in these cats will end up seeming as "less" than real "American philosophers". For the Category:American women philosophers cat, I realize there are other by-nationality cats, if this one passes I will nominate the lot for upmerging to Category:Women philosophers. As proof of ghettoization, see American women who aren't american philosophers and african Americans who aren't American philosophers. Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:43, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge - per nom. Greg Bard (talk) 17:06, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Upmerge Although, it is proof of how self-centured Filipacci is that she hasn't gotten her dad to let her write a scathing expose in the NYT about this problem that Obi-wan has identified for us. She only cares about Wikipedia categorization when it affects her. Alternately we could try splitting by century, but I'm not feeling up to that project.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:12, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • You should consider striking this direct personal attack against Amanda Filipacchi. And you certainly shouldn't be demanding another NYT article as proof that someone "cares". This is an embarrassment.__ E L A Q U E A T E 01:04, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I've spoken to multiple people effected by these categories, and the general feeling about them is that they don't really care one way or another if nationality/race is included as an explicit cat. They can see benefits of some of the cats (especially the very specific ones like African-American philosophers,) and don't feel ghettoized by them, but also don't see enough of a benefit in having the cats separate to actively worry about whether or not they are kept. It may be worth noting that a fairly large number, though not all, of the catscans Obiwan brought up are people who *aren't* American philosophers. I'd have a much stronger opinion here if the suggestion was "get rid of the category women philosophers," but as it is, I'm not sure I have a strong enough opinion to !vote. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:23, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
re not American philosophers, can you give a few examples? I don't understand your point. And no the next step would not be getting rid of the top-level women cat - that one doesn't violate last-rung rule since the siblings are diffusing on nationality. Re:don't feel ghettoized, do you mean if someone is 'African-American philosopher' but NOT 'American philosopher' they don't care? Eg they're ok with AP being just white men?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 11:35, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Kevin Gorman: Bueller? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:01, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, long week. I had only halfpaid attention to the fact that you had used a concatenation scan, someone has gotten rid of the people who weren't American in it since last I looked. But yes, most of the academic philosophers I've spoken to about it are perfectly okay with it as a compromise. In an ideal world, we'd use a tag scheme - we could tag people 'american' and 'philosopher' and 'woman' and other properties of interest separately, and have an easy way for people to look for combinations that interested them. Unfortunately, that's not how our cats work. We have catscan, but that's something only experienced wikipedians use generally - not our readers. There's a major difference between "American woman novelist" and "African-American philosopher" - being a notable american novelist who is a woman isn't an uncommon or unusual thing. Being an African-American or a woman who is a notable philospher is an uncommon/unusual thing. Having the specific cats makes it far easier to find those subsets of interest. To give you an idea of the difference: according to the American Philosophical Association, there are only around 55 African-American women who are academic philosophers in the US today - there are around 13,000 academic philosophers in total. That is significantly worst representation than any other field, including physics or engineering. So: benefit - easy to find unique group of interest, detriment - they don't appear in the top level cat. From the half dozenish academic women philosophers I've spoken to about the issue who were all specifically interested in Wikipedia, none of them felt strongly enough about it to care. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:47, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
thanks for the outreach Kevin, but I'd suggest a list could be just as useful, if not moreso, and has no risk of ghettoization - and our guidelines don't have a 'if people you ask don't care' exception clause. I hope you remember that hundreds of bloggers, tweeters and dozens of major media outlets covered our ghettoization of women novelists, so for us to just 'accept' ghettoization of African American philosophers doesn't cut it. In any given field, one can identify ethnicity or gender X that is underrepresented or rare or special or worthy of study but that is only a minimum bar for a category - you also must be able to create a category that is not final-rung and not overly intersected - otherwise we'd have African-American gay 19th century poets, and so on. It's also a potential disservice to those weren't asked, and who may care.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:54, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Lists, like catscan, are something that the majority of our readers don't actively use. Of course I remember the American novelists thing. I spoke to multiple media outlets about it at the time and since. A minor media scandal we had in the past that was hilariously blown out of proportion shouldn't guide what we do here; what is useful to our readers should. If this ended up getting coverage, members of the American Philosophical Association's Committee on the Status of Women would likely be speaking to the press about it pretty quickly and explaining why in their view it doesn't particularly matter. For that matter, I suspect more philosophers would take issue with the use of the word 'ghettoization' in this context than the cat scheme... Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:53, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
actually Kevin I remember during that debate we checked in the list vs the category - the list was viewed I think 3 or 4x as often, at least at the time. Lists come up higher in google search results since they are in mainspace vs cat space. If you have a better word than ghettoization plz suggest it but I'm not sure it's worth worrying about.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:47, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly oppose - Oh jeez. I have a good deal to say about these proposals, but I just don't have the time right now. For the moment I only have time to note that Category:American women philosophers is part of a well-developed and valuable set of sub-categories for Women philosophers by nationality. More later! Cgingold (talk) 00:15, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • as I noted, if this passes I will nominate the rest of that tree to up merge to women philosophers. The national subcats will all be ghettoes otherwise, indeed they already are. 'valuable' does not override 'violates WP:EGRS guidance'. Just remember what happened with American women novelists - it was at the time basically a final-rung category and the parent couldn't be fully diffused resulting in ghettoization and a media shitstorm. Do you want to be the one who explains to the British philosophers why many of the women are in the subcat?-Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:20, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Damn, I knew I shouldn't have looked again! :) All I have time to say is that that real solution to the issue of "ghettoization" is for all of the articles to be listed in both the main category and the subcategory. And now, I really do have to go! Cgingold (talk) 00:23, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • As Wikipedian-in-Residence at UC Berkeley, someone who has written like five dozen bio of women philosophers including some British ones, and been in direct communication with some of those I've written about, if the cats do get kept, I volunteer to be the academia and media contact on the issue :p Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:49, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Upmerge: American women philosophers; few people care if someone is an American woman philosopher or happened to have been born in Britain. Keep African-American philosophers; simultaneously keep them in a higher level cat. African-American philosophers is a group of interest to readers, and secondary sources focus on African-American philosophers as a specific group of interest - dozens of books have been written that focus solely on African-American philosophers. (The same is not true to the same extent with American women philosphers; far more secondary sources treat the topic of interest as 'women philosophers,' not 'American women philosophers.) Get rid of the use of the word ghettoization in this context, it has problematic implications. I'll pop over to EGRS myself at some point shortly to suggest that. I'm sure that my suggestion of keeping African-American philosophers as a cat while also keeping it's members in a higher level cat violates some guideline; guidelines are general rules, not hard policy, and exceptions should be made to them when those exceptions are in the interests of our readers. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:53, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Kevin Gorman, your statement, I'm sure that my suggestion of keeping African-American philosophers as a cat while also keeping it's members in a higher level cat violates some guideline is actually exactly what is needed and it doesn't violate the guideline. For example, Hubert Harrison should be in Category:African-American philosophers and should also be in Category:American philosophers; one of the articles you were involved with Mary Louise Gill would be in Category:American women philosophers and Category:American philosophers. Reading more, I think you might have worked this out in your comments below.__ E L A Q U E A T E 05:10, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, I always figured it was a more or less appropriate solution, I just assumed it went against a cat guideline somewhere that I'd never bothered to read.Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:25, 30 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Doublecatting an article in both a parent category and a subcategory of that parent at the same time is something that's almost never actually needed, and almost never serves any actual substantive purpose. There may not be an explicit rule against it (although there is an explicit rule discouraging it in most cases), but there should be — because even in the cases where it has been allowed there still usually isn't a useful reason why an exception is actually warranted. It's very nearly always unnecessary category clutter. Bearcat (talk) 17:43, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
hi @Carolmooredc: as I mentioned in my nom, if this passes I will of course nominate the rest of the tree. Given that this currently ghettoized and I plan on proposing the rest, does that change your vote? Thanks--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:42, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So you want to get rid of Category:American women by occupation but not Category:American men by occupation?? Actually, I was confused by "Category:American women philosophers to Category:American philosophers, Category:Women philosophers". It seems to me category entries like those under under Category:American Jews by occupation have long been fought over and they are still there. These definitely seem to be in WP:Ignore all rules territory. Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie) 18:18, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
as Kevin points out above, 'American women philosophers' is not really a subject of study whereas women philosophers is. I don't understand your comment about am women by occupation vs am men however, I'm only talking about the upmerging the 'women philosophers by nationality' tree if this nom passes. I will take a look at the american jews one it's quite likely there are violations of last rung rule and I'd be happy to see any violating cats iced.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:00, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
See also above where I point out that "African American philosophers" is an explicit subject of study, which is another cat you put in this nom. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:35, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly oppose It seems like this "last rung" argument keeps getting used as if merely saying it exists is enough to conclude a discussion. But Category:American women philosophers can be further subdivided in lots of other ways, by university, by state, by philosophical discipline, for example. Why is this "last rung" argument only used when categories involving women and ethnic minorities are up for deletion but not for categories in other topical areas? Who says when a last rung has been reached when, in fact, a category can actually be further divided into subcategories?
Gender, religion and ethnicity are nondiffusing categories so, of course, all of these philosophers would also appear in the American philosophers category as well. Merely having a category for different genders, ethnicities, religions or sexualities doesn't mean these categories are a "ghetto". There are tens of thousands of categories that rely of aspects of WP:EGRS, should they all be deleted? If you are actually considering dismantling the entire "Women philosophers by nationality" category tree if this deletion gets approved, it's even more important that these categories exist. Liz Read! Talk! 23:12, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Upon looking at this more, I actually don't see at all how any of these categories are in violation of EGRS. The last rung of EGRS that Obi references simply states that subcats based on race, ethnicity, gender, or sexuality should be nondiffusing - not that they shouldn't exist. I'm going to go ahead and agree that they should be nondiffusing, but don't see an argument made yet as to why the categories that are subjects of individual study shouldn't exist... Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:19, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
last/final rung rule exists to prevent these types of categories because they naturally - that is by their very nature and structure - act to ghettoize. The reason is that the parent, American philosophers, cannot be fully diffused. The Category:Philosophers tree is quite complex and robust, and splits philosophers by many different axes. However this level of split has not been maintained down to the nationality level and I don't think the philosophy project has undertaken to do so. One of the main maintainers and developers of the philosophy tree is @Gregbard: who voted to merge above, so I'd appreciate his further thoughts and commentary. From my POV, splitting nationality by gender is only rarely justified in cases where the national tree itself is well developed and fully diffused - which is not the case now nor is it likely to be (I don't forsee us splitting American philosophers by state as we might politicians.) thus, these cats are indeed violating the last rung rule, and I've demonstrated that they already serve as ghettoes. The reason again is their structure - if the parent was fully diffused it would be much less likely to ghettoize. A contrast is women philosophers - the top level philosophers category CAN be fully diffused, so there's little chance someone would be put in 'women' philosophers and not also be put in several neutral sibling categories - but 'American women philosophers' is full of women who aren't American philosophers - or in any siblings. There is a temptation by some here to duplicate whole category trees by tacking 'women' or 'men' or 'ethnicity X' onto the front but this is a really terrible idea - such EGRS category trees must ALWAYS be simpler - it is the last rung rule which guides this. Without it, the chance for ghettoization increases substantially, I speak from practice, having deghettoized a fair number of cats. As to Liz's point, Liz I respect you as an editor but it is rather tiresome that every time I nominate a category for deletion you accuse me of wanting to delete the whole tree of women - it's an extremely bad faith assumption. I assure you this is not my goal and I have created a number of cats in that tree and added hundreds of women to it. I target only bad categories, ones that are much more likely than others to be ghettoes. I'm not going after women philosophers and in fact once this is wrapped up I will try to populate it further.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 02:17, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The last rung of the guideline requires that cats based on the criteria covered be nondiffusing if the top level cat can't be fully diffused. It doesn't say they can't exist. It would be a trivial task to make any of the cats you've nominated nondiffusing - I could do it with AWB in fifteen minutes, and run it as a monthly task if necessary. That makes this not a discussion about whether or not the cats violate EGRS (because if they do, that's easily fixable,) but if they're useful cats. I happen to agree with you that the category American women philosophers probably shouldn't exist, because most people don't care especially if a particular woman philosopher is an American, and "American women philosophers" is not a common explicit subject of study. However, as I point out above, "African American philosophers" is a common explicit subject of study, and is thus a useful cat and should continue to exist. In my mind, XfDing a bunch of things at the same time only works if they're in identical situations, and that's not the case here. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:53, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
hi Kevin - no, per EGRS such cats should ALWAYS be non-diffusing on neutral parents - (unless the tree is fully divided by gender for example) - but the non-diffusion is regardless of whether the parent is fully diffused. Non-diffusing cats are confusing, because they can be non-diffusing in one tree but diffusing in another tree! Final rung rule is different, it says such cats should not exist as the final rung - in other words they need diffusing sibling categories that can diffuse the parent. In this case there aren't enough to do the job (unlike say philosophers). All 3 cats are in the same boat for me, youvd made a case to except the African-American one, so we'll see what others think (you didn't vote on the asian one - also if kept should we add Native American, Hispanic/Latino, Jewish, Armenian, etc in terms of ethnicities? )--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:17, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Ottawahitech: I've explained my rationale in detail above; they violate final rung since the parent can't be otherwise diffused. It's as simple as that. Notice there are 900 articles in Category:American philosophers - that's a great example of a cat that isn't, and can't be, fully diffused - there are only 5 real diffusing categories of Category:American philosophers: Category:American Confucianists‎, Category:American ethicists‎, Category:American logicians‎, Category:American political philosophers and Category:American religious philosophers‎, it doesn't seem like there is a desire to fully diffuse this tree. OTOH, how many articles are directly in Category:Philosophers? Very few - that's because Category:Philosophers CAN be diffused, in a bajillion different ways. (FWIW, I just updated EGRS to make this even more clear.) As to "why" does this lead to ghettoization, I'm not sure, it's just been my experience whenever I find one of these, that people are ghettoized within, whereas people in Category:American women in politics are rarely so, since the parent tree can be diffused in so many other ways. So it has to do with the structure - the structure of last-rung cats like these make it more likely for people to be ghettoized - it has something do with editor behavior, understanding of non-diffusing categories, number of cats they are likely to tag, structure of parent and sibling cats, and even a broad misconception that such gendered categories are supposed to be diffusing. In my experience, many people still think this - these cats act differently than all other cats, so unsurprisingly people screw it up. During categorygate I posted a "degheottization" quiz, and everyone failed it. Non-diffusing cats are confusing, but they are much less likely to ghettoize if the parent is otherwise divided.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:00, 28 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Ottawahitech, what we have to avoid when it comes to categorization is a scheme whereby an unmarked "occupation" category becomes "straight white men only", and women, LGBT people or people of colour in the same occupation get shunted off to marked subcategories instead of sitting alongside those men. A marked identity subcategory can exist if it's complementing other categories in which women can still sit directly alongside men, LGBTs alongside heterosexuals, people of colour alongside Caucasians, and so forth — if the identity category is replacing unmarked categories, however, then it's ghettoizing those people since they're getting taken out of the relevant unmarked categories. Bearcat (talk) 17:22, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose merging. I do not agree with the nominator's rationale. There is no reason that persons should not be in both these categories and in the relevant parent categories. older ≠ wiser 15:15, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Bkonrad:, with all due respect, I'm not sure you understood my rationale. I'm not arguing that people shouldn't be in these cats and the parent - indeed if these cats are kept they absolutely SHOULD be. I'm arguing that the cats should be deleted as they are MORE LIKELY to result in people only being in the subcats, and not the parents - thus these cats are more likely than others to ghettoize, and per WP:EGRS they are not even supposed to be created in the first place.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:00, 28 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the rationale and much of subsequent discussion has an ease of understanding comparable to a scholastic disputation concerning the number of angels dancing on the head of a pin. But I did understand the rationale and I agree with commenters who consider the comparative rarity of women in the parent categories to be an excellent ipso facto reason for the categories to exist. If by ghettoize, you mean that the will not also be in the parent cat, well, I'm sure there are some very smart persons with the technical chops who could very easily write a script to identify such gaps and even a bot to automatically re-populate them as needed. older ≠ wiser 23:29, 28 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I understand, and non-diffusing categories are not for the faint of heart. This is trickier than it seems. If the person in question is already in a diffusing cat of the parent, then they should NOT be simply placed in the parent. However, if they are only in other non-diffusing cats, they should be. How can the algorithm determine if the category in question is diffusing or non-diffusing? Not all non-diffusing categories are so-marked. Additionally, sometimes it's not the parent, but the grandparent that matters. And the non-diffusion only happens in some trees, since a given cat can be diffusing on one parent and non-diffusing on another. It's a rather tricky question, and it wouldn't be trivial to code a bot to handle this situation, and especially not to solve the general case. Therefore, when we have categories which are likely to ghettoize and violate the final rung rule, we just delete them instead of waiting for a mythical bot that likely won't arrive.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:54, 28 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Further Comment - Yes, I support the merge, and elimination of this unnecessary division. I am finding in many areas (not just "women v men"), categories are being created which, if we took these distinctions to their logical conclusion would result in the creation of thousands of categories. If a person really wanted to get access to all "women" "philosophers" who are "American" or any number of other combinations of qualities that a person could possibly want to search for, one is always able to use tools available that are much less labor intensive for us editors. For instance. Furthermore, the creation of these categories makes the use of these kinds of tools more and more difficult. The whole enterprise is just plain unnecessary. Why should the "American philosophers" category stand as exclusive to men, and not to women, by the way? Why aren't we relegating all the men to ghettoized categories like "American men philosophers" so it harder to find them? There are just a lot of problem with this practice. Greg Bard (talk) 14:43, 28 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Oppose merging. This is a clear misuse (misunderstanding?) of the final rung "rule" found in the editing guideline WP:EGRS. There is a clear way to ensure that articles in these categories are not isolated from the main category. The purpose of this guideline is not to forbid all EGRS sub-categories, it's to encourage that we make sure that entries are represented in the more general category. I am not convinced that the best way to facilitate the finding of EGRS-connected articles is to eliminate 90% of the EGRS-connected categories. __ E L A Q U E A T E 01:04, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
EQ, you are conflating final rung with non-diffusion. They aren't the same thing. The guideline states that if the parent can't be otherwise divided, the EGRS cat should not be created. That's final rung. Where in the name of Baal did you get 90%? You realize we have around 6000 gendered cats for women, right? Women philosophers will still be easily findable in Category:Women philosophers where they are very unlikely to be ghettoized. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 01:14, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Every article in Category:Women philosophers for all women philosophers of all countries then? One giant soup? Is that really the spirit or letter of WP:EGRS? At that rate we'd just have one category, Category:Women with no sub-cats to "risk ghettoization". You might be the one having a problem convincing people of your interpretation of "final rung". You also haven't shown that Category:American philosophers isn't otherwise divided. And...I took a look at your "proof of ghettoization" tool results and they don't seem to prove "ghettoization" in a majority of the cases found, as the articles are mostly represented in the general cats (which is great), or in one of the "otherwise divided" subcats, such as Category:Stanford University Department of Philosophy faculty (which I'd hope you agree is a bit more problematic a category as a subcat of Category:American philosophers than the ones nominated, as I don't think all "(Specific University) philosophy professors" are necessarily best fit under "(Specific Nation) Philosophers"). The categorization of some specific articles should be fixed to match the intent of the guideline, but it's no reason to scrap a whole category system.__ E L A Q U E A T E 05:10, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
yup one soup. That is common. The EGRS cats are almost always somewhat less specific, with good reason. We've had repeated consensus on this issue across dozens of categories - for example that nationality-splits by gender are not always warranted. The opposite, which is to replicate the whole tree with a gendered analogue, is a nightmare. Even Kevin admits that 'american women philosophers' is not a topic of study in the way women philosophers is. I can cite many other examples of 'soups" if you're interested. And yes, at least by my definition, they are all ghettoised. A woman who is in 19th century philosophers and logicians and american women philosophers IS ghettoised, since shes not in the parent or neutral sibling of AP, so she is defacto categorized differently than a male peer with the same qualifications. When women novelists were being moved, many remained in other generic writer cats, but the fact they were no longer american novelists drew outrage. For the solution we'll have to agree to disagree. We need to draw a line somewhere, and the final rung rule is an important part of that line IMO. The short term fix of moving a few articles does nothing to address the systematic way in which these cats tend to ghettoize - a year from now there will be 30 others. As for Stanford i dont really care much one way or another, if you find a better parent be my guest. As for 'otherwise divided', i count 5 diffusing subcats, and they arent sufficient to diffuse the vast majority of articles in the parent - thus not sufficiently divided. Its not good enough to have a few minor diffusions, you really need to be able to clear the head cat, say by state for example, but that doesnt make sense for philosophers. The top level philosophers cat is extremely well divided and indicates that they prefer the division to happen at that level, so im aligning with that.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:38, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
WP:EGRS says Subcategories by country are permitted, you're pushing the ones in Category:Women philosophers for deletion. You say there's "repeated consensus", I know consensus has also repeatedly gone against your interpretation. The fact you were trying to modify WP:EGRS to include your personal interpretation highlights the fact that it doesn't include your specific interpretation. WP:EGRS gives advice about how to ensure things like Category: African-American poets are not a "final rung" in a tree. It does not say to eliminate all categories like Category: African-American poets, as you are suggesting must happen to Category: African-American philosophers. This nomination is still misguided.__ E L A Q U E A T E 13:32, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Category:African-American poets is a really bad example, since it's not a final rung - the parent can be divided. My change fixed that example but whatever, it's under discussion now. If you want to say "Keep, it violates last rung rule but IAR", that's fine (this is effectively Kevin's vote), but you can't say "This doesn't violate last rung rule" - it means you don't understand what final rung rule means. This is a direct quote: "If a category is not otherwise dividable into more specific groupings, then do not create an E/G/R/S subcategory." The intent of that, which @Bearcat: who wrote it can confirm, is that the parent must be able to be diffused - not just with a few narrow cats, but more or less fully (again, I note, there are 981 philosophers still in the head cat, and very few of them can be diffused). In other cases we've done full diffusion with states, or with centuries - but I don't see consensus to do that here - it would mean a massive amount of recategorization across dozens of countries in a tree that is already very well developed at the non-national level in Category:Philosophers.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 13:58, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
For Category:African-American poets, Category:African-American writers has nearly 600 entries as head cat, Category:American poets has over 2800. You seem to be saying that Category:American philosophers hasn't proved it is dividable into more specific groupings because it has 981 entries. This is silly. Obviously it is a category that is dividable into more specific groupings, as it is divided into more specific groupings. I note you're qualifying in this last comment with "more or less" fully, but in most other places you demand "fully" divided. You do it in your rationale: All three of these are in violation of final rung rule of WP:EGRS - the parent category cannot be fully diffused in other ways. Indeed, the parent currently has 981 articles. Full and completed conversion of a head cat into a container category is not what WP:EGRS advises (not even "almost a container") and your rationale depends on a deeply incorrect notion that the number of entries in a head cat is relevant here.__ E L A Q U E A T E 16:30, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
EQ, I don't make these nominations willy-nilly, I actually research them, and I looked at a great number of American philosophers, and studied the whole philosophy tree, before concluding this nomination. I am quite confident that, given the current sub-categories of American philosophers, it cannot or should not be divided in any significant way and the head cannot be emptied. There has not been a movement from those who manage philosophy categories to divide by-nationality-by-century or by-nationality-by-state, which would be one solution - but no-one has done it or proposed it and I think it's a bad idea which will needlessly complicate the tree and require recategorization of thousands of articles - just to keep these cats. Category:American poets just hasn't been diffused, but it can be fully diffused, and something like "19th-century American poets" is indeed a topic of study in a way that "American women philosophers" is not.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:49, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Elaquate, you're a little bit right, but only in the sense that a parent category does not have to already have been fully cleaned out before an EGRS category can exist. Wikipedians can be lazy sometimes, and the work hasn't always been done yet. For example, editors have not comprehensively emptied out Category:American writers yet, but that is still a category in which every single entry that's sitting in it can be filtered down into one or more subcategories instead of sitting where it currently is, because a comprehensive set of diffusing subcategories (particular state of residence, particular type of writing, etc.) already exists — the category isn't already fully emptied of individual articles, granted, but it can be and should be and all that will take is somebody buckling down and getting it done. A category most certainly does, however, have to be fully diffusable — the work of cleaning out the parent category does not have to have already been fully completed before an EGRS category is allowed to exist, but it does have to be possible to completely empty the parent category of individual articles. Bearcat (talk) 16:53, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
There is almost exactly zero value in ever declaring that a non-diffusing subcategory can exist alongside a category that isn't diffused on a different criterion, because that just causes the non-diffusing subcategory to essentially be a violation of WP:DUPCAT for no compelling reason besides "because we can". There is no useful reason for non-diffusing EGRS subcategory to exist if an article still has to be left directly in Category:American philosophers anyway — normally an EGRS subcategory should only exist if everybody can also be sifted out of Category:American philosophers into other non-EGRS subcategories. In other words, a non-diffusing EGRS category should generally only exist in cases where it's actually a moot point whether that category is diffusing or not, because other points of diffusion are in place so that the parent category is still completely empty (or at least completely emptiable) of individual entries regardless of the non-diffusingness of the EGRS subcat. If that cannot happen, then simply saying that "this category is non-diffusing, so it can exist as long as I leave all the articles in the parent category too" is not a valid rationale for the existence of the EGRS category — because there simply isn't a useful or encyclopedic reason for that double-categorization to even be happening at all.
And also, for the record, the other criterion that an EGRS category has to meet to be permissible is that the intersection actually constitutes a defining characteristic in its own right. It cannot be "people who happen to be both X and Y" — you have to actually be able to make a case that there are actually external reliable sources out there which actually identify "American women philosophers" or "African-American philosophers" as an encyclopedic thing that's distinct from American philosophy as a whole. You cannot just take any two categories that happen to have a couple of common members and create a new intersection subcategory to replace or sit alongside the existing categories; the intersection itself actually has to constitute a distinct and identifiable thing, which is actually a distinct and identifiable topic of distinct and identifiable study in its own distinct and identifiable right. But that hasn't been demonstrated here, for any of the three categories in question.
Obi-Wan's updates to EGRS were also not an "unsupported personal interpretation" of the rules which he was trying to "impose", but were a completely accurate summary of the state of consensus about the rule as it actually stands. Obi-Wan is not imposing tendentious interpretations of EGRS that go against established consensus, but simply tried to improve the guideline's clarity about what the consensus is. Kevin Gorman does have a point that categorization on Wikipedia would probably be better-served if we had a tag-based system where we just applied each individual characteristic as a tag of its own, and then the "categories" could be generated on the fly by intersecting any set of tags of the user's own choice, instead of having to be actively curated — but that isn't the system we have now, and until somebody figures out how to implement that we have to work within the constraints of the system that we do have. And the constraints of the system that we do have do include minimizing duplicate categorization and avoiding ghettoization situations. Bearcat (talk) 16:53, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Both laudable goals. To your point about interest and duplication, it is trivially easy to point out that people are specifically interested in groupings like African-American philosophers from academic, philosophical or purely historical angles. People have clearly expressed interest in those groupings in this thread. This interest in particular EGRS intersections exists and is not a duplicate of the parent category. Nobody has suggested we keep categories "just because we can" as some kind of floating abstract exercise. To your earlier point Category:American philosophers is realistically dividably on other grounds, even if it hasn't been done to satisfaction yet. Not a violation of WP:DUPCAT. There is no "rule" against having a non-diffusing sub cat based on EGRS where there is editor and outside interest to have one, and the head cat is realistically dividable on other grounds. I've seen no evidence that Category:American philosophers would be impossible to divide at some point. (I agree a tag system would be an improvement and make some of this moot, but not having one also doesn't mean deleting non-diffusing sub-categories for which there is strong editor support.)__ E L A Q U E A T E 17:44, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly, what other non-EGRS grounds is Category:American philosophers realistically subdividable on? The only possible point I can think of is by indidivual state they happen to be from, but that would violate WP:OCAT#Intersection by location. Secondly, there's an important distinction I think you're missing: while the work of actually filtering articles down into the diffusing subcategories doesn't necessarily have to have been fully completed already, the diffusing subcategories do have to exist — the fact that it might be theoretically possible to eventually implement a diffusing subcategory scheme is not enough to justify an EGRS category, if a diffusing subcategory scheme is not already in place to be used. Bearcat (talk) 17:56, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see where it has to already be in place, only that it realistically could happen; It's "realistically dividable" not "realistically divided"; anything more seems like bureaucratic fundamentalism. Philosophers could be subdivided as philosophers are currently sub-divided elsewhere, into political philosophers, ethicists, logicians, religious philosophers, etc. (Oh, sorting by religion is also covered by EGRS. a bit strange that Category: American religious philosophers wasn't nominated in this batch). It's not "fully" diffused, but I wouldn't agree that it is advisable to demand "full" container-class diffusion before helping people navigate to EGRS non-diffusing sub-cats and I don't agree it is current practice to do so.__ E L A Q U E A T E 18:35, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Category:American religious philosophers is for philosophers of religion, not for philosophers who are religious. Come on, be serious. Yes, you COULD divide American philosophers by all sorts of things, but it hasn't happened, and it is unlikely to happen for the simple reason that the dominant and incredibly sophisticated categorization scheme for philosophers is all happening here --> Category:Philosophers. Are you signing up to do this work and bring all of those cats to the national level?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:52, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You're making my point. If Category:American religious philosophers is just an example of Category:American philosophers being divided into non-EGRS sub-categories, then it's prima facie that Category:American philosophers can be, and is, divided into sub-categories. Also, your nomination relies on the idea that Category:American philosophers is the only parent cat to consider here. WP:EGRS allows breaking things down by nationality, and it's still of arguable (and argued) benefit to Category:Women philosophers to do this. You might not see it, but I don't see much point going over it when so many people disagree with you here.__ E L A Q U E A T E 20:04, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
EQ, if we follow your logic, we get to the absurd conclusion that a single diffusing category which diffuses 10 members of a 1,000 person category is enough to say "it's no longer final rung"- you're missing the whole point and everything BC has been saying. Breaking down Women philosophers by nationality is irrelevant if it's likely to lead to ghettoization in the generic tree - you don't need to quote policy to say "one can sometimes break things down by nationality" - but it isn't the case that all generic cats broken down by nationality should have women-cats broken down by nationality. The non-diffusion and risk of ghettoziation makes that impractical. see Category:Women by occupation which has many examples of cats not broken down by nationality. 200 is pretty small in any case.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:30, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
"Religious philosophers" is not a topic that EGRS would have anything to do with — that's a distinct genre of philosophy, not an identity characteristic of the philosophers per se. And EGRS may not be written as clearly as it could be, mainly because every time somebody tries to rewrite it to improve its clarity about where the consensus actually stands, somebody who disagrees with the established consensus comes along and reverts that as "non-consensual", but because EGRS categories present distinct issues the consensus around them is that the diffusionable siblings do have to already exist. As I noted above, there's exactly zero value in having a non-diffusing subcategory of an undiffused parent category in the vast majority of cases — even where it has been allowed, it's still not actually necessary or useful. (There is, for example, no genuinely good reason why every first-level national subcategory of Category:Films by country actually needs to be a complete catalog of all films, even if they're already in a "Country genre films" subcategory right alongside it — the only reason that those are "all-included" instead of diffused is because those categories were created by someone who believed that every category on Wikipedia should always be "all-included" and no subcategory should ever be "diffusing" at all, a position which he was never actually able to gain consensus for except in a couple of specific WikiProjects where he held some personal seniority.) If an article has to stay directly in Category:American philosophers even while being in an EGRS subcategory, then the EGRS subcategory simply isn't warranted at all — in an EGRS situation, a comprehensive diffusion scheme which does enable the parent category to be completely emptied of individual articles does have to already exist alongside the EGRS cat. You're allowed to put off the actual act of emptying (though I really do wish somebody would clean up Category:American writers properly!) — but you're not allowed to put off the existence of the diffusion pipes. Bearcat (talk) 19:04, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Other stuff looks bad. I would certainly agree that there are a lot of categories needlessly by-nationalized. I wouldn't agree that a non-diffusing sub-cat only makes sense in container categories or about-to-be container categories. That's theoretical utility beating up on some categories people are actively using without major ghettoization. Other people agree that it's useful to have things like Category:African-American philosophers and that it represents an intersection people care about in the greater world. Other people see value in a cat like Category:Women philosophers separating an indistinguishable soup of 200 articles by nationality (as allowed by WP:EGRS) into the 140-odd US and other nationalities to help navigate the category beyond an assumption of US-centricity. Asserting they're "not warranted" or "not allowed" is not convincing here. It just seems like an opinion dressed up as a bureaucratic demand that you admit isn't in the guideline per se.__ E L A Q U E A T E 20:04, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
EQ, as I said before, feel free to say "keep these categories, guidelines be damned" - but don't try to argue around long-standing consensus of what the guidance is supposed to mean. In the next few weeks we will correct the guidance to be even more explicit on this point, but I simply point that Bearcat WROTE that guidance, so you should attach some weight to his comments.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:30, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
There's no actual argument being made here, just a little WP:OWNERSHIP-by-proxy. I don't think there's a clear consensus that this one part of the guideline trumps anything but IAR. (That's not even an argument that Bearcat is offering). If it was true, then there wouldn't be many consensus decisions and practice against it. You're entitled to your view, of course.__ E L A Q U E A T E 21:49, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would suggest that this nomination be closed, and that further nominations be made of individual categories so each can be examined on its merits in a sensible way. IMO, group nominations only work when all members of the group are substantially identical. In talking about African-American philosophers vs American women philosophers earlier in this nom, I demonstrated that this is not the case here. If/when individual cats are renommed, we should do fun things this discussion hasn't seen much of, like bringing in outside secondary sources to help determine if a particular cat is frequently treated as a notable topic by reliable sources. Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:25, 30 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I haven't been following this very closely, frankly because categorization is a mess. But the rationale seems to be based on an interpretation of rather byzantine and arbitrary rules rather than on what is actually helpful for readers. IMO, these are useful categories. If the rules say such categories should not exist, that suggests to me that the rules are broken. older ≠ wiser 22:44, 30 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Even further comment - I would support splitting up these proposals, as I would support keeping "African-American philosophers," but not "American women philosophers", as it would be appropriate to have an African-American philosopher in both the American philosopher category and the African-American philosophers category. We don't ghettoize on those articles, but we do with women apparently. There is far too much to comment on, and correct here. However, suffice it to say that Obiwan is completely incorrect in his characterization of religious philosophers. By and large, a philosopher is either a philosopher of religion, or he or she is a religious philosopher. They are not quite absolutely, but very exclusive of each other, although there are a few notable exceptions. This is also true of theologians. With very few exceptions, if you are a theologian, you are not a philosopher.
In regard to EGRS, I have to wonder is we are going to go further and have 21st century American women philosophers, and 20th century French women philosophers, etcetera?!? This path will lead to thousands of completely unnecessary categories. We should be backing off of "20th-century French philosophers" and the like as it is. Greg Bard (talk) 17:40, 2 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Greg. If that is the case re: religious philosophers we should clear out that category, as it doesn't seem to be correctly populated (I was looking at the contents vs the description). Actually I'm not really sure I see the value of "American religious philosophers" - surely what is more important is the religion they adhere to, no?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:00, 2 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Now that Greg (who is a very active philo person,) myself (who has written many of the articles on women philos in one of the cats in question,) and a number of other people have said that this needs to be handled on a case by case blanket instead of as a basket nom, can someone uninvolved please just close this nom and those who feel it necessary pursue future noms on a case by case basis? Basket noms only work when everything in the basket is substantively identical, and that's clearly not the case here. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:52, 7 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Nationalism in Ireland[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename without prejudice to re-creating the old category if it is needed as a parent. – Fayenatic London 20:38, 18 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale; from what I've seen, this category seems to be specifically about Irish nationalism, "Nationalism in Ireland" would also include other nationalist ideologies in Ireland, such as British nationalism and Ulster nationalism, just like Category:Nationalism in the United Kingdom, maybe we could have two categories, one about Nationalism in Ireland and one about Irish nationalism. Charles Essie (talk) 22:21, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Republicanism in Ireland[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename. Good Ol’factory (talk) 00:06, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale; per Irish republicanism. Charles Essie (talk) 22:08, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • The issue is Irish republicanism is not merely a republican movement, it's not like republicanism in Spain or the United Kingdom, it is an Irish nationalist ideology that has more similarities with pan-nationalism and irredentism than republicanism. Charles Essie (talk) 17:48, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Australian nuclear test sites[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename to Category:Nuclear test sites in Australia. Good Ol’factory (talk) 00:03, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Objected C2D. No Australian nuclear tests have ever taken place: the tests that took place in Australia were British nuclear weapons tests. Therefore the current name is misleading. Category:Nuclear test sites in Australia would work, but would disjoint the category from the "Y X" naming pattern of the rest of the tree (and would require some awkward renames for the rest of the tree if the whole shebang was renamed). However, there is a simple and appropriate title available, Category:Nuclear weapons tests in Australia, that matches the category's main article, Nuclear weapons tests in Australia, and it should be renamed to that. The Bushranger One ping only 21:26, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding Montebello Islands, this[1] says "with the exception of ground zero sites (the exact places the bombs were detonated) radiation has dropped below levels considered dangerous to public health" and the current article (with a lead that does not mention the nuclear tests) suggests that (to modern Australians) the tests are (just) part of the island's history.
Category:Nuclear test sites is appropriate for articles like Punggye-ri Nuclear Test Site, but articles in this category include an island of 90,650 sq km, a town of 20000 people, and articles that make no mention of nuclear testing (probably because some editors try to make the category a complete list by adding articles regardless of the article topic/content). DexDor (talk) 20:20, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Rename to Category:Nuclear test sites in Kazakhstan. I have just added another parent, Category:Soviet nuclear weapons testing -- which is probably sufficient to indicate whose weapons were being tested at the sites in Kazakhstan...
It seems to me that the same approach can be applied to all of the other cases as well. No real need for long, complicated category names or for two entire category trees. Cgingold (talk) 00:07, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Nuclear test sites in Australia is acceptable, although sorting out the rest of the tree will be a bit of a bother. - The Bushranger One ping only 11:52, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I suspect you meant to say that Category:Nuclear test sites in Australia is acceptable? Cgingold (talk) 02:37, 25 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
...I have no idea what you mean. Fixed. Thanks for that catch! - The Bushranger One ping only 05:36, 25 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rename to either of the proposed "... in Australia" names and add inclusion criteria saying the category is only for articles about the tests/sites themselves (i.e. not for articles about the nearest town or the region). The same goes for the other cats of this type. DexDor (talk) 19:43, 25 April 2014 (UTC)----[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Polyamorous people[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete; there seems to be general agreement that the creation of Category:Polyamory advocates would be OK. Good Ol’factory (talk) 03:34, 7 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: I'm not convinced this is defining of the people who are in it. Of all of the bios I clicked on, only two mentioned polyamory in the lede (the Zell-Ravenhearts), and this is apparently because they have been active in the movement for polyamory. I'm not convinced this is an identity we need to classify on, since for example we don't classify "Men who have sex with men", and there are likely lots of sports players who fit the definition of polyamorous but don't identify as such. It's possible there may be scope for a category about people who have been activists around getting better recognition/etc for polyamory (like Category:Polyamory advocates), but as a "I identify as this" category I just don't see this as defining. A list seems fine and already exists, but for example we don't have Category:People in open marriages even though we have a list of same Open_marriage#Notable_people_in_open_marriages, and we have Category:People_convicted_of_bigamy (because this has legal implications) but not Category:People with multiple wives, which would be quite numerous...Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:18, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • The real problem here is a gap between the definitional value of the category and the name that's been given to it. A category would be legitimate for the people for whom polyamory is directly related to their notability — Dossie Easton and Janet Hardy, for instance, are notable principally for co-writing The Ethical Slut, pretty much the basic "bible" of polyamory literature — but should not be used for people who happen to identify as polyamorous but aren't particularly notable for that identification per se. (That just opens us up to POV debates about whether to add every professional athlete who ever had two or more girlfriends at the same time, for instance.) Rename to Category:Polyamory activists and remove anybody whose article doesn't source or mention that they fit into the narrowed scope. Bearcat (talk) 21:34, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Bearcat. What would you think of Category:Polyamory advocates instead. Activist sounds a bit too... activist, as if they are actively trying to convert other people, whereas advocate could capture those who are rather advocating for acceptance, etc, but not trying to convert or even actively change specific societal laws, etc.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 22:34, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The difference between "advocate" and "activist" clearly doesn't land for me where it lands for you, if you think that's the difference between those two options... Bearcat (talk) 07:08, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Bearcat: care to elaborate? I dont have strong feelings either way, just advocate seems softer and less forceful than activist. Are these guys in the street marching, trying to get laws changed, or are they writing nice books and explaining their lifestyle to others? For example i can see an animal rights activist as compared to an advocate for veganism.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:21, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I don't perceive "advocate" to be less forceful than "activist" — I suppose for some speakers there might be a distinction, but to me they're just synonyms without much of a distinction of focus between the two. The person who just writes nice books and politely talks about their lifestyle to others is in no way precluded from being called an "activist", and the person who gets out into the streets to march is in no way precluded from being called an "advocate". Bearcat (talk) 16:58, 29 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nom; the compromise floated by Bearcat is preferable to doing nothing, but suffers from the problem of the "activists" family of categories which are basically placement grounds for people famous for one thing (usually entertainment or sports) also advocating for (or against) some (usually political) position. What is an activist, any way? Our article activism defines it as "efforts to promote, impede, or direct social, political, economic, or environmental change, or stasis", which is so nebulous to include merely signing a petition (or refusing to sign a petition) or voting (or choosing not to vote). There are people who are primarily notable for little more than their activism, perhaps a category tree for them could stand but now, Category:activists and its subcats is a disaster (oddly 14 bios are categorized merely as "activists", without regard to what their activism relates), despite a slew of members in Category:Activists by issue. Let's not add to the problem. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 00:31, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete This is too broad and too likely to get in people for whom this is non-defining.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:18, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Category:Married couples exists perhaps this should be formatted along those lines instead, categorizing articles on polyamourous unions. Category: Polyamourous unions the advocates category would be separate, since being an advocate does not mean you necessarily participate, and people juggling multiple girl/boyfriends at once should be excluded as they have not committed to a union. -- 70.24.250.192 (talk) 05:29, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Married couples is a subset of duos, and only contains articles which are about two people who also happen to be married. That cat is itself dubious anyway and I may put it on my list to delete. In any case, polyamorous unions would only work if we had several articles about more-than-two people who were in such a relationship (vs categorizing individual bios within, which we don't do for married people either).--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:00, 24 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete or Rename - The concept is too nebulous (and thus too broad) to serve as a category because it deals with behavior rather than identity. I would however support Obi-Wan's. very sound suggestion of converting to Category:Polyamory advocates and removing those articles that don't meet that description. Cgingold (talk) 23:52, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:0 hyperbolic volume knots and links[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename. Good Ol’factory (talk) 00:00, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Rename. It is mathematically incorrect to say that these knots and links are hyperbolic with zero volume. Their complement has a geometry that is not hyperbolic. So we should name this category more accurately. See Hyperbolic link for context. David Eppstein (talk) 18:33, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • question If a knot is invertible but not amphichiral, won't it be listed as the 51 knot in the Alexander-Briggs notation? Thus, couldn't it also be described as a (5,2)-torus knot.he that can also be obtained as the intersection in C2 of the unit 3-sphere S3 with the complex plane curve of zeroes of the complex polynomial z2 + w3?? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:45, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    Excellent example of where it's difficult to tell in written text if a comment is sarcasm or sincere (or sincerely sarcasm : ) - jc37 21:47, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm just concerned if this CFD closes as nominated, we'll have to deal with cusped hyperbolic 3-manifolds with n cusps, which can be thought of, topologically, as the interior of a compact manifold with toral boundary. If a 3-manifold equipped with a complete Riemannian metric of constant sectional curvature -1 isn't DEFINING, I just don't know what is.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 22:00, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have no idea whether it is WP:DEFINING, but it is definitely WP:BEWILDERING. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:38, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support As mentioned in Hyperbolic volume, the hyperbolic volume of a non-hyperbolic link or knot is defined, by mathematical convention, to be zero. They can do this because the hyperbolic volume of a hyperbolic link or knot is a finite topological invariant that is greater than zero. Given that the type of link (hyperbolic vs non-hyperbolic) is more a fundamental property than the hyperbolic volume of its complement, it makes sense to move this category to Category:Non-hyperbolic knots and links. I also can't see anyone trying to search for a knot or link by the size of its hyperbolic volume. --Mark viking (talk) 22:02, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Um... yeah.. What he said. support, I guess.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:52, 17 April 2014 (UTC)----[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Hong Kong people stubs[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: create Category:Hong Kong artist stubs and Category:Hong Kong musician stubs, upmerge as proposed. Category:Music biography stubs is only populated with European country-categories at present, so I decided not to create a new one. (Although I participated below, we have a CFD backlog at the moment, and there is no dispute here.) – Fayenatic London 17:56, 30 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There are a couple categories in Category:Hong Kong people stubs, which are too specific to meet the threshold. I propose creating:

Fortdj33 (talk) 17:17, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I would be OK with Category:Hong Kong musician stubs including both {{HongKong-musician-stub}} and {{HongKong-singer-stub}}. I only suggested Category:Hong Kong music biography stubs, because I thought it would fit in better with the other subcategories of Category:Music biography stubs. Fortdj33 (talk) 18:29, 2 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Music biography stubs contains composer stubs and musician stubs by country. We could create a parent cat for music bios in case there are others e.g. producers. – Fayenatic London 19:18, 18 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Films shot in...[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete. Good Ol’factory (talk) 23:58, 15 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Propose deletion: The majority of the articles that I reviewed listed as members of these categories do not mention how the film was shot, or citations are not provided to verify claims as to how the films were shot. No discussion in the vast majority of cases I looked at regarding how the film was shot constitutes a defining characteristic. In many cases it appears the categories are being applied indiscriminately and en masse. I might recommend that these categories would be more appropriate as List articles. DonIago (talk) 16:10, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete all, listify some. Especially some of the rarer formats, like Gevacolor or Todd-AO, the contents could be listified similar to what has been done for the 70mm films. But 35mm films? No, its' far too common. In any case, such characterizations are not DEFINING of the films in question.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:39, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all per nom. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:50, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - these are technology advances of their time. This is demographic information for films. And as for listifying, yes, but only if this discussion results in deletion. but I think this works better as a category, as inclusion doesn't require explanation, it's a binary question: was the film shot in this format or not? If the articles need to be updated to note inclusion, then that is a question of member inclusion, not whether the categories should exist (I also think WP:SOFIXIT comes to mind : ) - jc37 21:29, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • What they said – Not every film is defined by its box office receipts or its list of stars, but you wouldn't exclude that information just because it's not all that important in some cases. Movie directories and guides abound, many of which qualify as reliable sources, some quite detailed. This appears to be more of a case of lack of interest in properly incorporating the information than a lack of encyclopedic value or reliable sources. Support listifying for many of these formats. RadioKAOS / Talk to me, Billy / Transmissions 12:05, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    @RadioKAOS: can you clarify your vote? While list of stars are important, we explicitly don't categorize based on that so I don't understand the example.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 15:13, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    It seems to me it wouldn't be out of line to ask any editor voting for Keeping the categories whether they'd also be willing to do the work to go through the hundreds of category members to weed out the ones don't belong and improve the ones that do, especially since we're talking about hours, if not days of work. If not, it seems unreasonable to ask that other editors do so. I wouldn't be averse to the categories being placed "under construction" for a finite amount of time while these improvements are being made. WP:SOFIXIT indeed. DonIago (talk) 16:25, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    There is no deadline, and many hands make light work. This is a wiki after all. - jc37 14:54, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes...and if we assume the categories as they are aren't up to WP standards, which I don't think they generally are, we could just as easily delete them and rebuild them with a greater focus on quality. DonIago (talk) 13:15, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I checked a sample of the articles in one of these categories (to see how many mentioned it in the lead) and in every case found it wasn't mentioned in the article at all. Thus it does not appear to be a WP:DEFINING characteristic. DexDor (talk) 20:10, 25 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, it just means that it hasn't been put in the article yet. - The Bushranger One ping only 04:37, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
If the people who write articles about films don't include the information in the text of the articles then that's a strong indication that it isn't defining. DexDor (talk) 05:03, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. Per nom. This is like categorizing novels by how they were written (pen, typewriter, dictation etc). DexDor (talk) 20:10, 25 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Er...not really. The writing is still writing. This is more like format: short story, novel, etc. - The Bushranger One ping only 04:37, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No it's not. If I was describing a book I've read I'd describe it as a short story, novel etc. If I was describing a film I've seen I'd describe it as horror, romcom, scifi etc (and possibly mention when/where it was set etc); what technology was used is pretty-much irrelevant to viewers. This is unlike, for example, describing a painting as watercolour, oil painting etc as that is more obvious to the observer. DexDor (talk) 05:03, 26 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Rivers of the Boundary Ranges[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: CFD closed administratively under IAR due to user behavior incident, closing as a No Consensus. I recommend leaving the CFD topics alone for one month prior to refiling, if it is still felt that removal or renames are necessary. This will allow for a cooling down of the behavioral problem.. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:51, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
next group also created while discussion underway, added --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:24, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: The categorisation of rivers by which mountain range they originate in doesn't appear to have any parallel in Category:Rivers, tho pls correct me if I have missed anything. All the 6 pages currently in the category are already in other categories of river-by-political-geography, BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:15, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
COMMENT That's an outright falsehood/distortion but all too typical of your lack of knowledge of this region; only the Whiting, Unuk, Craig and Lava Fork (4 articles) have Alaskan political geographic divisions on them, none have Canadian political geographic units on them; the Keta is in Alaska but was newly-created and has not yet had Alaskan p.g. units added; your argument is even more irrelevant as there are no British Columbian equivalents for same (the Alaskan boroughs are regional municipalities; there are no municipalities in this region of BC, other than tiny Stewart at the southern end.Skookum1 (talk) 07:00, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Wrong. @Skookum1: That's a personal attack based on a misrepresentation.
  1. "an outright falsehood/distortion" -- very harsh words, but possibly justifiable if true. However, they are demonstrably false.
  2. "all too typical of your lack of knowledge of this region"
    That's a personal attack, particularly when I had explicitly asked for clarification of anything I had misssed
  3. "only the Whiting, Unuk, Craig and Lava Fork (4 articles) have Alaskan political geographic divisions on them, none have Canadian political geographic units on them".
    This is demonstrably untrue: Craig River, Iskut River, Ununk River, Whiting River were all in Category:Rivers of British Columbia. Lava Fork was in Category:Creeks of British Columbia. Keta River was in Category:Rivers of Alaska. I had referred to "river-by-political-geography". BC is a province of Canada; it is a Canadian political geographic unit, so all 5 rivers in BC did have Canadian political geographic units.
  4. "your argument is even more irrelevant as there are no British Columbian equivalents for same (the Alaskan boroughs are regional municipalities".
    I made no reference to boroughs or municipalities. How can an argument be made irrelevant on the basis of points neither asserted nor alluded to?
Please strike your comment. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 11:04, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment/oppose Plan was to create similar subcategories for lakes and other geographic items currently in mountain range categories; in the regions involved (the Pacific Cordillera) mountain ranges constitute whole vast regions and their categories currently include many non-mountain items; political geography is a separate categorization than by natural geography and geographic regions that are not political; other large regions include the Interior Plateau and its subdivisions; some subcats already exist for other regions, such as Category:Hydrography of the Okanagan for both rivers and lakes; regions adjoining the Okanagan are the Thompson Plateau to the east and Okanagan and Shuswap Highlands to the east and northeast and the Shuswap region to the north; all are natural regions and there is no reason to suggest that geographic items like rivers should not be categorized by natural regions, which are also COMMONNAME points of reference in the very complicated geography of the province and the larger region it is part of i.e. the Pacific Northwest.
      • in the context of regional geography a mountain range is a region; e.g. the central Pacific Ranges of the Coast Mountains has areas that are neither part of the Chilcotin Country to the east or the South and Central Coast regions of the province. they are a region unto themselves; as are the Boundary Ranges;
      • in fact, classifying lakes and rivers by e.g. regional district is not found in Canadian primary sources; GNIS in this region classifies by city/borough but BC Names/GeoBC, the geographic names office of the British Columbia provincial government, classifies them by Land District, as does the Canadian Geographic Names Database per example here for Mount Ratz. Land districts are the cadastral survey system underlying all land titles and descriptions.
      • The only source that comes to mind in British Columbia that would classify anything by regional district (i.e. "political geography") is the British Columbia Archives, a branch of the Royal British Columbia Museum, which classifies its photo holdings that way; not sure about their text resources as I rarely look there.
      • The British Columbia Ministry of Forests Forest districts of the day are often cited by scientific papers which can be found aplenty in the ministry's online library database, and the ministry itself often addresses research studies on forests by biogeoclimatic zone (names for some of which necessarily use mountain ranges as part of biogeoclimatic region names).
      • That ministry is one of the several overlapping tiers of the subdivisions of British Columbia, as are Ministry of Environment Regions (which governs provincial parks and protected areas while the Ministry of Tourism regions are different again; and necessarily provide geographic descriptions according to their own "political geographic regions".
      • Federal Canadian Ministry of Environment documents and reports/sources may use the Ecozone ecoregion system.
      • summing up classifying geographic objects by natural region is common fare, even if no other WP:WikiProject Rivers categories use mountain ranges as regions. But in British Columbia and Alaska and Yukon, mountain ranges are regions and a valid classification system independent of very changeable political geographic boundaries.Skookum1 (talk) 15:53, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Reply. There is of course a case for geographically categorising all sorts of landforms and other natural history topics by regions based on natural history, provided that it is done consistently. The category system is based on an interlocking tree of categories, where different attributes of topics are combined in different ways; what makes it work is choosing the same set of attributes. If we start categorising topics on a wide range of geographical bases, then all we is to split existing categories without creating the navigational structure which makes the categories useful.
          Do we have a list of the natural geographic regions of North America? Is it being used as the basis for existing categories. If not, then the decision to create such a set of categories should be taken in a systematic way from the top. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:01, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note canvassing. Note that 5 Wikiprojects have been notified of this discussion. The number of projects seems unusually high, but project notification is acceptable per WP:CANVASS provided that notifications are neutral. That is not the case with the apparently identical notifications made to WikiProject Geography of Canada, WikiProject Alaska, the Canadian Wikipedians' notice board, WikiProject Rivers.
    @Skookum1:, please replace those notifications with a brief neutral notice using {{cfd-notify}}. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:09, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Why should notifying affected WikiProjects about CfDs which directly involve them seem (a) unusually high and (b) constitute "canvassing"? I am only enlisting people who write river articles and work with river categories all the time (which you do not SFAIK) and not really saying much else that I have not said here i.e. that mountain regions in this region of the North American continent constitute bona fide regions? You made no effort to contact or notify them yourself, so why should I not? I am not Polling, only informing editors who may be interested in commenting on this CfD (which you have now expanded with a misspelling "deleing") and not attempting to influence the vote in any way.Skookum1 (talk) 19:00, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Reply. Read WP:CANVASS. The message should be neutral. Your message is not neutral. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:47, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Neither is your CfD, which at this point also comes off as COI considering your against-wide-consensus/momentum closes of BC town articles and indigenous titles and your peremptory heavy hand against me despite a no-consensus verdict at the ANI. I've been told "not to take it personally" (this CfD) but given the last few weeks, that's not just counterintuitive but disingenuous.Skookum1 (talk) 21:34, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
          • Skookum1, if you have a problem with a RM close, open a move review. If you believe that this CFD is disruptive, ask at ANI for an admin to take action. But stop WP:CANVASSing. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:53, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment There is no guideline that I am aware of that stipulates that political geography and only political geography should be used to classify/category rivers with.Skookum1 (talk) 19:00, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • See my reply above, at 18:01. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:42, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • And still you cite no guideline, don't even know if there's a list of natural physiogeographic regions of North America (there is) and you don't even know what other river/mountain/region subcats there are but you field a CfD anyway?? This is a nuisance CfD and in the light of your recent behaviour towards and actions against me can not be construed in any other way than what it looks like. These are regions beyond your ken in scale, or experience in real life or in Wikipedia; regional subcategories are needed and nowhere is it mandated that only political geographical subdivisions province/states may be used to categorize them. These may be mountain ranges but they constitute regions and "Geography of FOO" like "Rivers of FOO" is perfectly valid even when "FOO" is not a county or a city.Skookum1 (talk) 21:34, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Skookum1, Rather than assuming bad faith, why not point to the existing structure of categories of landforms by region if it exists?
          The category I first nominated was not parented in any other category of rivers, so as noted in the nom I looked for other similar categories of rivers-by-physiogeographic-region, and didn't find any. I didn't proclaim my results as conclusive; on the contrary, I asked to be corrected if I had missed something. I remain open to the possibility of categorising landforms by by-physiogeographic-region if it is done systematically through a consistent structure of such categories.
          The fact that a category is not specifically forbidden by a guideline does mean that it is a appropriate to create it. There is a limit to the number of categorisation schemes which can be created without causing category clutter and properly maintained, and CFD regularly reviews new categorisation schemes to establish a consensus on whether they should be kept. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:50, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment There is no Category:Rivers of the Alps (yet) but there is Category:Lakes of the Alps, demonstrating that geographic-object categories of non-political geography categories already exist.Skookum1 (talk) 19:03, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Procedural note. I have just added to this nomination Category:Rivers of the Omineca Mountains, which was created several hours after its creator commented in this discussion. Please desist from creating more categories of this type until the discussion has established a consensus on whether type of category is appropriate. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:21, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Note 3 more also created after by the same editor after its creator commented in this discussion. Please just hold off until a consensus is established. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:33, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • There is no reason whatsoever to stop creating by-region rivers category because of this CfD; you're welcome to keep adding them but why don't we hear from some other editors first as to whether or not this CfD even has a leg to stand on?Skookum1 (talk) 02:02, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge all. We don't categorise rivers in this fashion. We categorise rivers by nation, and by state/province/territory, and occasion by riverine system, but we don't categorise them by a geographical area: that is WP:OC and can lead to pileups of narrow categories that only confuse the reader. - The Bushranger One ping only 02:15, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Rivers of the Okanagan, Rivers of the Chilcotin and Rivers of the Cariboo. These are regions of BC and fall in line with other areas, see Category:Rivers of France by region, Category:Rivers of Ukraine, Category:Rivers of the Czech Republic, Category:Rivers of England, Category:Rivers of Quebec, Category:Rivers of Ontario by census division and my favourite Category:Rivers of Nunavut. Unsure about the others as I'm not clear if they are regions or not. CBWeather, Talk, Seal meat for supper? 03:45, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • they are, though their outer edges are part of other regions like the Okanagan etc. e.g. the Boundary Ranges verge on the Stikine Plateau and other landforms to the east; they do not so far as I know include the mountains of the islands of the Alexander Archipelago in Alaska. The ranges are so large that their core areas do not completely belong in any of the "ordinary" regions (of which only a few are "physiogeographic regions" e.g. the Lower Mainland is not a landform, but it is part of the Fraser Lowland landform).Skookum1 (talk) 04:51, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment re the claim of WP:Overcategorization I have consulted WP:WikiProject Categorization and found these items as goals of the project:
    • Structure categories and subcategories to improve usability.
    • Assist in category diffusion.
    • Verify that categories used are relevant to the topic.
    • Ensure articles are not on both a category and its subcategory.
      • In the case of the Canadian Rockies subcat that category is in Category:Rivers of Canada because some are in BC, some are in Alberta; and some like the Fraser are in several regions.
    • Ensure categories appear without annotations and are in line with WP:NPOV.
      • There is nothing POV about any of the category titles
    • Ensure categories are used in articles in an uncontroversial and self-evident manner
      • the only controversy here is being made by people who don't understand the geography of British Columbia or the necessarily terrain-based subregions thereof.Skookum1 (talk) 05:05, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • I have been told in the past that categories with over 400 articles did not require diffusion; ~192 articles is (obvioulsy) well short of even that. That said, while I personally don't believe diffusion is necessary here, I won't be losing any sleep if the determination is the other way. - The Bushranger One ping only 06:13, 18 April 2014 (UTC) - The Bushranger One ping only 06:05, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose We currently categorise rivers by state, by drainage basin and by (large) region, including mountain ranges. Geographically speaking it is entirely reasonable to do so. --Bermicourt (talk) 06:48, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Procedural note. Rather than waiting to see what consensus is reached by this discussion, User:Skookum1 has continued to create new similar categories, which I will now ad to this nomination.
    This is pointless disruption. If the consensus is to keep this type of category, they can be created once the discussion is completed. OTOH, if the consensus is to delete or merge them, then their creation now is just wasted effort. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:18, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • @CambridgeBayWeather: – Mmm...oogruk. @BrownHairedGirl and Skookum1: – You know, I would love to be more active on here. However, witnessing the recent back-and-forth between you two has led me to question the amount of time I have spent. Let's just say that a lot of what I've read is nothing but headache-inducing (Can you say "interaction ban"? Good, I knew you could.). Because Skookum made those notifications, it led me to browse around. I wonder how relevant Category:Rivers of Kenai Peninsula and Category:Rivers of Seward Peninsula are to this discussion, even if outside of its scope. RadioKAOS / Talk to me, Billy / Transmissions 12:05, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Yes, they are; though I note that maybe the Kenai Peninsula one should have "the" before that name. Skookum1 (talk) 13:37, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment on the basis of these categories. I have been trying to find evidence that these regions are clearly defined in reliable sources, and regularly used, but have had little success. Geography of British Columbia##Physical_geography is almost entirely unsourced, and the List of regions of Canada#British_Columbia has no sources.
    So I started looking at the articles, of which the first is British Columbia Interior#Definitions (also unsourced). It all sounds very vague: "often considered", "no precise definitions", "often broken up informally". The next section British Columbia Interior#Major_subregions_and_nomenclature has a reference only for one name in a long list, which is littered with qualifiers such as "sometimes referred to", "usually just referred", "historically be considered to be part of", "the usage has now come to apply to".
    Whatever about the principle of categorisation by physiogeographic region, this scheme appears extraordinarily vague and unsourced. Using such vague terminology for a system of regional categorising looks like a form of WP:OR, and fails WP:OC#SUBJECTIVE.
    I appreciate the comments which explain a need for a regional structure to sub-categorise BC, but so far we don't appear to have one which is objectively defined in reliable sources. Can any of the editors familiar with this topic identify reliable sources for objectively-defined regions of BC? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:55, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Re the lists, they are necessarily not referenced by dint of being a list....and that is a pan-Canadian list, with input and discussion from more than just me; most region items are cited if you go the actual articles instead of complaining about the list being "unreferenced".....may you're unfamiliar with list formats just like you are about rivers and regions categories......Skookum1 (talk) 13:47, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reply, Duh, I am that editor; your anti-AGF attitude towards my knowledge of the region, and the cites that *I* know where to find, is more than a bit boring and obfuscatory:
    • Post-edit conflict (the above post was written since the following) Those regions/categories are only unsourced because I've been too busy combatting stupid ideas by interlopers playing title/word games for years now; like the two-month RM over the use of hyphens properly, instead of endashes, in regional district names; ultimately solved by recourse to the legislation and regulations establishing them. The conclusion was obvious to any British Columbian, who sees such names all the time, but there was a two-month stonewall of quibbles by.....never mind. Same with the application of modern names for indigenous peoples that are now current in Canadian English, which was bitterly fought against by......never mind, but I'll let you take a guess. All were AGF challenges to an experienced editor from the region who is something of an acknowledged wiki-expert on regional history and geography and toponymy; same situation here, you challenging things you don't know anything about and names that, while familiar to us, are totally alien to you. As for the region-names you say are uncited, that's not entirely true as born out by the names of various regional districts, electoral districts, school districts, tourist region names and more; depending on which the following may be unhyphenated or hyphenated when they occur:
    • those names didn't just come out of nowhere, they're built out of region-names that remain in common use; Okanagan, Cariboo etc; and there are those like
    • Since you appear to be sharpening your knife to go after the region categories, I'll go and start citing usages and providing examples; List of landforms of British Columbia and more. You being AGF about this category, right from the start, without even having a firm grasp of guidelines or river-categorizations or BC geography and geography categories, is to me just another waste of valuable time as was the case with the indigenous RMs and the regional district hyphen/endash silliness.
    • "Go get me a shrubbery" is what this game is, and I'm the one who knows where the shrubbery is and what it is, and it's an incredible waste of time and wiki-energy. Challenging someone with known regional expertise about what is a very obvious subcategorization system; that is, obvious to anyone who's not looking for a guideline to go after it with; and who doesn't even know anything about the mountain ranges/regions you want to get subcats deleted/merged for; and who ignores the very valid point that rivers, like lakes, while definitely identifiable by mtn range or region, do not belong in categories which are for mountains that are "members" of the range. Category:Glaciers of the Boundary Ranges is also a very natural category (there are very few lakes because of the extreme glaciation in the region) and, as observed by an "oppose" vote here, mountain ranges (especially very large ones like the Ominecas, Boundary Ranges, and Cdn Rockies) are perfectly valid geographic categorizations for geographic objects.
      • What's OR is classifying geographic objects by political geography, unless citations such as the MoF or reports to/for it describe something as being in e.g. the Kamloops Forest District; just as schools should be categorized by school district, and hospitals by Health Region, and parks by Environment Region; re the Ministry of Forests controls 95% of the province and was by far the most powerful ministry of the government for years, and its political geography is more relevant in the outer beyond of the bush country than any regional district.....the only municipality on the Canadian side of the Boundary Ranges is the tiny town of Stewart, north of that to the Yukon border there are less than 2000 people west of the Rockies (five degrees of latitude).
      • I'll be back with links to the source books for the ranges, among which is a map showing their precise boundaries, and the text of the government report Landforms of British Columbia which discusses lakes and rivers by the landform/mountain range they are in; that source was used to build the Category:Mountain ranges of British Columbia and List of landforms of British Columbia and similar ; and gee, guess who made all those, huh? And who knows the material? I do, upside and down.
      • Other than previous knowledge, I built the range and prominent-region system for the Canadian Mountain Encyclopedia (three years of often 16-18 hour days including research as well as data-plotting), now renamed the Bivouac Mountain Encyclopedia and came here to Wikipedia with that knowledge, as well as 50 years of experience living in British Columbia geography and in many of the regions just named.
      • The anti-AGF nature of this CfD is all too clear, the meaningless of the quibbles to try and denounce the created categories, and your demanding I stop making them, is totally out of line and that interaction ban mentioned above is a damned good idea; and he doesn't mean I shouldn't work on BC geography categories while someone from Ireland can, without knowing what they are doing or anything about the places or regions in question. You have no expertise in the region at all, or any familiarity with Rivers categories as you even said in your nomination; it's because I created it, IMO, that you want to delete it and engage in more pointless procedure instead or recognizing that you are not qualified to debate any of this.
      • The amount of constructive time wasted here that could be spent creating articles and citing the many out there in need of them (which I've been doing in spite of this CfD's time consuming "go get me a shrubbery" demands and general niggling on trivial readings of guidelines) is profound; but ultimately, like the RD hyphen/endash business (and the time-wasting Poland-Lithuania RM that became parallel to it) and the native-endonym RMs of last year, what the "reality on the ground" is will prevail over narrow readings of guidelines that are not in the spirit of the guidelines; and the obvious facts of the geographic names as demonstrated in the regional pairings listed above, and the existence of sources which directly classify lakes and rivers by the mountain range or other landform they are in.
      • Discussion on these matters were held within WikiProject BC/Canada long ago; also in relation to {{Subdivisions of British Columbia}}; Outline of British Columbia will have more, though it, too, is incomplete.Skookum1 (talk) 13:31, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - citations Here ya go:
    • Landforms of British Columbia: A Physiographic Outline, by S. Holland 1964 (revised 1976), British Columbia Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources
    • Landforms of British Columbia: A Physiographic Outline- Physiographic map, by S. Holland 1964 (revised 1976), British Columbia Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources
    • access to online Physiographic map of the Canadian Cordillera, W.H. Mathews, Geophysical Survey of Canada (Natural Resources Canada), 1986
    • They were rather easy to find, being on List of physiogeographic regions of British Columbia (which I built/wrote). I've read the Holland book cover to cover, ultimately more than once really, and examined its sections on each range or other landform in great detail in the course of my work with the CME and also in fleshing out mountain range, landform and region articles/lists and more here.....the map shows very clearly the mountain ranges and their subdivisions and other major landforms like the Interior Plateau and its subdivisions.
    • The geographic regions that you complain are "unreferenced" are all citable one way or another;
      • I just found a prime source for Boundary Country, i.e. this BC govt website,
      • and on Thompson Country there's The Thompson Country, Mark Sweeten Wade
      • I google-book searched for Lillooet Country and got lots of results, as is necessarily the case with such a well-known and long-historic region or any of the other regions you allege are "original research"........ now will you stop the contentious and tendentious attacks on my expertise and experience here by questioning category after category after region after region without ever having heard of any of them before?? Or do you want more shrubberies??Skookum1 (talk) 14:49, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Just added a google books search to Chilcotin Country; some of the items there can be used as primary references; I'm too busy looking for other shrubberies just now.Skookum1 (talk) 14:59, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • RE Category:Rivers of Haida Gwaii and your suggestion that that archipelago-region is original research, I think you should read Talk:Haida_Gwaii#Move.2FRename_this_page_Haida_Gwaii_.282008-2011.29.Skookum1 (talk) 14:59, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Reply. Skookum1, calm down. Looking for sources is not an attack on anyone's expertise; it's the basis of how Wikipedia works.
          You have posted above 3 or 4 screenfuls, 90% of which is irrelevant to this discussion. So far it seems that you have a variety of sources defining various individual regions in different ways. All useful stuff, which helps reference the individual articles.
          However, in the midst of all that I don't see any single source which defines a coherent set of regions, or evidence that the set is widely-used. Have I missed it?
          The reason I look for evidence of such a set is the vagueness I pointed above in the list, in which the scope of many regions is heavily qualified with uncertainty.
          BTW, there is no need for a long reply. A brief pointer to the source(s) for that single list will do, along with a few pointers to evidence that it forms the basis of a widely-used physiogeogaphy system. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:19, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
            • 95%??? No, they're all relevant to the issues at hand, you're just looking for more things to quibble about because your "logic" and vague hand-waving in the direction of guidelines/conventions doesn't have a leg to stand on. It's this CfD nomination that's "irrelevant", as are your objections and ongoing shrubbery-demands like "I don't see any single source which defines a coherent set of regions, or evidence that the set is widely-used." Well, the evidence of that would be the consensus of Canadian editors who have vetted the Regions of Canada list and related items; your inability to grasp that Vancouver Island, the Chilcotin, Haida Gwaii and other regions named are normal, valid subdivisions of British Columbia is just stubbornness, IMO, and little else. It would be nice if there was a Geography of British Columbia tome that spelled out the regions in detail, but to my knowledge there isn't, though there are books about those regions, often by title if not simply mentions-in-text; but the evidence of these regions is in front of your face in the dual names given, you just refuse to see it because you don't want to though they're obvious to anyone in WP:WikiProject British Columbia (not a few of whom have left Wikipedia because of tiresome red-herring "discussions" like this one). By what you have said just now, you behave as though I hadn't provided a citation for the mountain ranges/landforms where lakes and rivers within them are catalogued and described as such; try reading a book sometime, you might learn something (like that one).
              • Skookum1, I was looking for an external source defining all these regions as a geographical system for BC. Instead you say that you don't know of one, and point me to a wikipedia page, which is a self-reference; Wikipedia is not a reliable source.
                I also asked if you had evidence that this was the basis of a widely-used scheme, but instead of evidence you just pronounce that "they're obvious". See WP:V. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:34, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • This CfD is spurious, your arguments and objections, specious, your wikilawyering tiresome. The cites are there, the regions are not original research, they are well-known and their names widely used in many ways, and classifying geographic objects by geographic regions is normal. What's not "normal" is the way you targeted a category I created in the wake of your hostile and condemnatory behaviour towards me recently; why To tie up my time? To try and drag me into confrontation so you can have another stab at having me banned? Hmmmm?? You were not neutral towards me at the time of filing this CfD or at anytime in the last few months; rather hostile in extremis and your obstinacy at seeing the realities presented here tendentious and, to quote you about my creation of more subcategories "pointless disruption" and completely contrary to "proper discussion"; any model of systematic categorization that works in more settled, less topographically-defined parts of the world does not apply;
      • BC regions are defined by terrain, by history, by identity, and your wading in saying IDONTLIKEIT is really a dead-end; you're riding a DEADHORSE but still wanting yet more shrubberies before you give in - or are (eventually) outvoted and outcited. the bulk RMs on the RDs were another pointless exercise in wasting time to restore the obvious as were the native endonym RMs of last year (St'at'imc, Nlaka'pamux, etc); all which ultimately came down to government sources and provable common usage, both RMs required because of someone wading in with MOS in hand and old linguistics citations on the other trying to foist on Canadian Wikipedia titles terms now obsolete in Canada and, in the case of the RDs, applying "style" because of someone's typographical fixation/fetish and hyphen-hatred.
      • WP:There are no rules is something you just don't seem to grasp, also. As hinted above, you need an interaction ban because of your deliberate intrusion on RMs and here with this CfD on topics you know I work regularly with. You should withdraw this very pointless CfD, apologize for fielding a nuisance discussion, and recuse yourself from topic areas where you know I am active; you have nothing to contribute to these categories or their contents, and are in the way of constructive work on Wikipedia, which CfDs like this non-starter are anything but.
      • And just because I spend time and words here having to repeat things to you you refuse to listen to the first time does not mean I should "cool down". It means that you should back off, learn to recognize that the categories are valid and useful, and go find someone else's time to waste.Skookum1 (talk) 16:32, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Skookum1, try to stay focused. This isn't complicated.
          There are 2 questions here. First, is there a consensus to start categorising landforms by physical geography? Some outliers have been identified, but in general that is not how they are done. Secondly, to make a viable category structure, the geographical units need to be stable, defined and widely used.
          The first of those questions is a matter of consensus; the second needs evidence. Not multi-screenful diatribes. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:18, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
          • Why don't you stay focussed and work on understanding the "95%" of what I have [posted that you claim is irrelevant but isn't?? I know the answer; you have an aversion to having to read detailed information; instead of "walls of text" here you are saying "multi-screenful diatribes" to demur from having to address walls of FACTS aand citations and examples. What you are doing is vexatious and it seems deliberately obstinate in refusing to admit that you are wrong. The notion that geographic objects should not be categorized by geographic region is nonsensical and not supported by any guideline anywhere. To aver that they should be categorized by political geography when you don't even know what that political geography *IS* is just more absurdity and the reality is that mountain range boundaries do not change overtime; political geographic units do (moreso than the customary normal region-names already explained, upon which those poltical geographic units derive/build their names), and that there are overlapping types of political geography in BC; but it's clear by now you're not reading anything I've said, and once again are attacking my style instead of addressing the evidence presented. The use of geographic categories for geographic objects is not illegal, though it seems you want it to be; the second demand for a specific type of citation rather than the reality that all such regions are citable (if not already cited on their articles) is just more "get me a shrubbery" gamesmanship.
          • BC is not like Ohio or Kildare; our geography is defined by terrain and topography and interconnecting networks of rivers and valleys; in some areas tthe mountain ranges suffice as region-designations because the larger regions they lie within (Cassiar Country, Atlin District, Peace River Country are too unwieldy; mountain ranges and plateaus have precise boundaries; and though your waffling about region names like Cariboo and Okanagan belies the fact that Canadian Wikipedia editors have stood by those titles and designations for a long time points to the consensus you are apparently trying to overturn here....by claiming that, in spite of having it shoved in your face, I still haven't fulfilled your endless picayune demands. This CfDs is vexatious and your goading me to provide information you claim is "irrelevant" but clearly have not had the patience to read or digest is just 'more of the same'. And I stand by my contention that you launched this CfD only because it was me who had created the Boundary Ranges subcat and wanted something to argue about. You can cut it with the "diatribes" against my writing style that you are indulging in as a way to dodge the points that I have presented, and take up more time. Your reading difficulties that are so obvious at this point, in combination with your wikilawyering that you haven't been satisfied yet, even though you still have not shown any good reason why these categories should not exist. Your are just tossing non sequiturs and evasions out; and it would seem despite your "cool down" comment that you are intent on proving that I am out of line and are engaged in WP:BAITing me. I repeat, this CfD is vexatious, the nomination specious and without reference to guidelines of any kind, and you are wikilawyering in the face of tons of evidence that you claim "95% is irrelevant" is tendentious, accusing me of being disruptive for continuing to create perfectly legitimate categories is what is disruptive. I don't think you've actually read 95% of it to start with.....you just like to argue and seem to have it in for me with your targeting of me by this CfD when all I wanted was to get away from discussions like these where the uninformed and obstinate babble about "consensus".....Skookum1 (talk) 18:18, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
            • Skookum1, your commentary here is treading close to, and on, the personal attack line. Your "I know the answer" statement, especially; given the pattern of previous behavior an uninvolved administrator could easily make the decision to block right there and then; your repeated accusations that this CfD was created on account of "want[ing] something to argue about", even more so. It is not required that an editor have knowledge of an area to contribute to it, and having that knowledge gives no special privileges, and demanding that another editor stop editing in an area on (paraphrased) "I know about this and you don't" could be considered in contravention of WP:OWN. Your knowledge is appreciated; your inability to accept opposing viewpoints without considering it an attack on you is not. It would be a shame to lose your contributions, so I would suggest you step back, have a cup of tea, and resume discussing the points that have been raised when you can do so calmly and address the points in the fashion of the Credible Hulk, instead of going Hulk Smash on the person making them, and not making assumptions as to why they are being made. - The Bushranger One ping only 01:34, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
              • This whole CfD was a personal attack in a very COI context, and already rather than honestly discuss the examples and citations provided my "walls of facts" are now styled as "diatribes" and told to "cool down" (both personal attacks, the latter imputing I'm "angry" when all I'm being is detailed and thorough) and claimed to be "irrelevant" which they are not; they are directly relevant; both of you have harassed me before, and both of you are INVOLVED; baiting me into words of frustration; your harassment of my writing style in other CfDs was disruptive and was not on-topic and "here you go again". This CfD was spurious, based on speculations about categorization and without reference to any guideline; "oppose" votes have been coming in despite the "bring me a shrubbery" game I've been spending too much valuable time on. You have nothing useful to say here, the nom doesn't have a leg to stand on, and you are throwing logs on the fire of non-topic behavioural issues; the behavioural issue here isn't mine, it's yours and BHGs, most blatantly anti-AGF in challenging the "senior" geographic wikipedian for this region, to the point of challenging whole hierarchies of categories and their main articles; this is disruptive, your own posts tendentious and contrarian and now in attack/criticism mode, as too often before. Quoting User:Rosiestep's userpage, which I found while looking to see who created the Alaska peninsulas categories (she did), I found this and there's lots of comments like this around: "A number of good editors have left wikipedia, or curtailed their editing, because their conduct, motives or character were attacked. And the departures will continue unless we change how we interact." You might start that with yourself in keeping your nose out of categories you know nothing about the subject matter thereof, and stop making AGF "votes" on same which have no relevance and are only IDONTLIKEIT in nature. This bit of Wiki-censorship is also common. You would do well to buy a mirror.Skookum1 (talk) 02:09, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
                • The CfD is not a personal attack. Calling your comments "diatribes" may or may not be entirely WP:CIVIL (depending on whether or not WP:SPADE - or, as you like to use, WP:DUCK) but it is not a personal attack. Being told to "cool down" is not a personal attack. You, however, are personally attacking me (and BHG) in your whole commentary above. - The Bushranger One ping only 03:11, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
*Reply "The Witchhunt Part II" huh? Your edit comment attached to that says "if you want it this way". No - YOU want it this way; you have had no relevant comments here, just IDONTLIKEIT, and even said you don't care about the outcome; but here you are, interloping again and turning the discussion onto me, now at another witch-hunt ANI, this time for a ban. What's needed as opined above by an "oppose" vote is an interaction ban on BHG, and now on you. You are doing nothing constructive either here or by launching another ANI against me; BHG's denial and evasion of evidence and examples is obstructive and contrarian; her RM closures were all contrary to the growing consensus very evident in the bulk of similar RMs; your invocation of TLDR and BLUDGEON against me in the Squamish mtter were completely off-topic and derailed that discussion; TLDR is not supposed to be used in discussion, yet you posted lengthy diatribes against me for it there and helped bury the "support" votes which of course were ignored anyway. Similarly the "oppose" votes here are being ignored and buried beneath denials of evidence, scolding behaviour, and what amounts to WP:BAITing. as with the last one, the ANI is a farce and a witchhunt and personal in origin - as is this CfD. An interaction ban on you and BHG to stay out of topic areas where, yes, I am the principal editor/creator is called for; that's not a WP:OWN issue as you claim in the ANI, but a simple fact of the matter with geography and mountain categories in my region; I am having computer problems (sleep mode engaging without being asked; this has taken four resumes to get written) so will not respond to the ANI for some time; no doubt the usual coterie of "tsk tsk" negativity and peronsality attacks will continue you, while you portray yourself as "not my enemy". Your actions here and there say otherwise, WP:DUCK.Skookum1 (talk) 05:07, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • No, I said that if this was kept it was no skin off my nose. Accusations of WP:IDONTLIKEIT are personal attacks. I do not believe this categorsation is necessary, but I specifically made that comment to tell you that it was not a big deal or personal if consensus was otherwise - clearly, though, that was a mistake. For the clarification of other readers: no "ANI...for a ban" was made: no desire for a ban was expressed or implied; the fact that you read that into it speaks of your mindset here clearly, per - as you like to use - WP:DUCK. - The Bushranger One ping only 07:27, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Reply Misrepresentation and misquotes are nothing new in witch hunts, the person who closed that ANI said very clearly "There is no consensus here for a block or ban." (User:Jehochman but a block was arbitrarily imposed anyway, and no sooner than I got back into being able to edit Wikipedia again, this CfD was launched by the same editor who imposed that non-consensus block; the optics of the equation are COI and aaxe-grinding and the terms of the nomination are clearly AGF. As for your wheedling here about not calling for a ban, you started the new ANI off saying as much. I thought you wanted that shut down, and this CfD set aside? Changed your tune now, possibly heartened by Tivanir's call for another block? The fact that you continue to grind this aaxe here, and there, suggests deliberate provocation and yet more AGF and, as noted above, the use of misrepresentation to do that.Skookum1 (talk) 08:14, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment as a student of history, categorisation of rivers (solely) by political subdivision is simply WP:RECENTISM. Conversely topographical areas may not be familiar to many people. It seems to me that "Rivers rising in the Jura", "Rivers emptying into the Indian Ocean" or "Rivers of the East African Rift" are, nonetheless useful, and do constitute defining characteristics of the rivers involved. All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 21:47, 18 April 2014 (UTC).[reply]
  • Oppose merging "Rivers of the Boundary Ranges" to "Boundary Ranges". It seems to me that this category (which should perhaps be moved to "Geographical features of the Boundary Ranges" will benefit from being split into "Rivers" "Ranges" "Mountains", and maybe "Glaciers" and "Lakes". All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 21:56, 18 April 2014 (UTC).[reply]
    • The only mountain range category which has a subcat for mountains of the mountain range I've seen so far is Category:Mountains of the Oregon Coast Range but so far mountain range categories are where mountains go; "Mountains of the Rocky Mountains" or other "Mountains of the FOO Mountains" seems unnecessarily redundant; works better for "FOO Range(s)" but yes, subcats for non-mountain objects like Rivers, Glaciers, Lakes, Settlements, Waterfalls etc are all natural subcategories especially with vast mountain regions that have many such features in them....settlements in the northern BC region/range areas are few and far between e.g. Caribou Hide, British Columbia (check the map from the coords on that page is hundreds of miles from the nearest municipality; if it's in a regional district its existence is beyond the building-permit and septic-tank-licensing reach of the RD; it happens to be abandoned and though not an IR (Indian reserve) like other aboriginal settlements it does not rightly belong in a system of political geography that has excluded natives from the start; categorizing IRs by regional district, which was going on for a while on the premise that RDs are allegedly "like counties", is inherently wrong as they are not governed by the RDs, nor do the RDs have any power over them, or as institutions, any presence within them; same goes for mountains, lakes, rivers. Same goes for mines, which are organized by Mining District, and as noted 95% of BC is under the direct or indirect control of the Ministry of Forests (whatever name it has now). Other than the mountain range/landform definitions, and the land districts, all other boundaries are subject to change; except the social/geographic/cultural regions like the Okanagan or Shuswap or Nicola, Kootenays, Cariboo etc, which have remained where they are for over a century despite not having any legally defined boundaries; precise boundaries in most cases being provided by, ahem, the summit-line of mountains/topography or other bit of geographic obviousness; in others as with the Lillooet Country, which is a collection of several valleys; such regions' boundaries are followed by political geographic boundaries 19 times out of 20, however.Skookum1 (talk) 00:59, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment re uncited, unreferenced regions The_Midlands has no references either; should it be deleted then??Skookum1 (talk) 02:58, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    As far as I can tell, there are no categories referring to The Midlands; East Midlands and West Midlands are official designations, so can have a category. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:40, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Since when does a category name have to have an official designation in order to exist; to me have Category:The Midlands with those two categories inside it would make perfect sense; it is, after all, a COMMONNAME and in wide use. As for the regions that it is claimed above do not exist and aren't citable, that's fiction as the region-names in question are building blocks of the official subdivisions of the province (which as noted are multi-layered and overlapping, with different boundaries and different subjects=citation realities); the Landforms of British Columbia citation, which includes descriptions of which rivers and lakes are in the landforms (including mountain ranges and range groupings), is official in origin and is the basis for the names used in the provincial gazetteer, i.e. BC Names, formerly known as BCGNIS and likewise for the federal-level CGNDB. It's not like these names are made up out of thin aair, or they're not in common use or citable; that was a specious claim to make as it's just not true; and consensus discussions on those titles were held. I would know, I was there, and the paper trail of official names that incorporate the challenged region names/categories is very clear, as is the historical record of their origin and their meanings; the Cariboo and Kootenays and Okanagan and so on are all common identifiers in not just British Columbia English but in Canadian English overall. But when an official citation for rivers-in-mountain-ranges is given, it's not even examined but pronounced "irrelevant". In fact, the mountain range definitions are often defined by rivers; e.g. the Finlay River is the boundary between the Omineca Mountains and the Cassiar Mountains; how much more clear could it be that the rivers are relevant to mountain range categories...or why would their titles have been in those categories in the first place???Skookum1 (talk) 16:12, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Skookum1, there are many conventions about categories which have developed over the years, and been upheld by repeated consensus. Some of them have been documented in guidelines, but the guidelines are not exhaustive and do not describe everything.
          One consistent convention is that categories should have clear inclusion criteria, which are neither WP:OC#SUBJECTIVE nor WP:OC#ARBITRARY. That ensures that categories have a clearly understood purpose, and which makes them stable. If a category scope is unclear, that leads to unsolveable disputes about the inclusion of articles, wasting editors time and confusing readers. That's why hundreds of categories have been deleted as subjective, and it's why The Midlands would make a very poor basis for a category. The term is widely used in England but its precise scope is undefined, so a category based on it would have inclusion disputes. The official regions such as West Midlands (region) work as categories because they are clearly and consistently defined; the question "is X in the WM region" can always be answered as yes or no. In that case the clarity of definition comes from an official source, but it could conceivably be derived in other ways, so long as it was clear, widely accepted, and stable.
          Where a term is widely-used but ill-defined, it makes for a poor category. For example, the term "conservative" is widely-used, but has many different meanings, so Category:Conservatives was deleted.
          That's why I am concerned about the basis of these regions. If the sources don't use a consistent terminology with a consistent meaning, categorisation becomes unstable and subjective. If the regional categorisation isn't consistent across a wide range of topics, the geographic structure becomes fragmented, so we can't compare things in the same area.
          There are many possible bases for geographical categories. Political/administrative; geologic; topographical; climatic; ecosystem; soil type; river drainage. Categorising by all of them would create massive category clutter on articles, and maintenance headaches. That's why practice so far has been to adopt the most widely-used form of regions, for all topics.
          BTW, if the Finlay River is the boundary between two mountain ranges, those ranges are a very poor basis for a locational category for it. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:26, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
          • All of that is extremely specious and not very logical, particularly the last snipe about the Finlay River; "irrelevant" perhaps. There is no "one size fits all" standard that can apply; for the record your post was 2311 characters/337 word long. You continue to deny that sources exist that apply to these regions, and that a government source where rivers and lakes are discussed as part of mountain ranges and other landform areas has already been provided (it's a very long book/PDF so it's unlikely that you deigned to read it, or even look at it). There are no political geographic units that are workable in the regions provided; in fact Stikine Region, which is the equivalent of a regional district in the northern half of the Boundary Ranges, is only an administrative area administered directly by the provincial government; and despite its title doesn't even include most of the Stikine River or Stikine Plateau or even the Stikine Ranges; and no source classifies rivers, lakes etc by that system with the exception of [royalbcmuseum.bc.ca/bcarchives/‎ BC Archives] where the location of photos in their system is labelled as being in this-or-that regional district. And the same institution (the Royal British Columbia Museum, which is a privately-run body, and not directly run by the government now), for its Living Landscapes offerings, has yet other region designations, one of them being Thompson-Okanagan i.e. the Thompson Country and Okanagan being components of that dual label (the western/northwestern part of the Thompson Country, though, is not included there). Both those titles are amply cited; your vague complaints that these are not valid, and not viable, are as per your other claims here not grounded in reality OR SOURCES - nor any specific guideline or convention.Skookum1 (talk) 02:43, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
            • Thank you for finally confirming what I feared might be the case: that there are a variety of different regional schema used by various bodies for varying purposes, with varying definitions. It seems that the set of regions on which these categories are based amounts to a synthesis of parts of several different regionalisation schemes. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:21, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
              • Your interpretation is POV but then since this whole CfD is AGF, not surprising; the various electoral district, regional district, forest region/district and similar systems are created from the traditional regional names which geography and history have produced; your claim that they are OR and SYNTH is only because of your ignorance about British Columbia and its geography. The region titles are not "a synthesis of parts of several different regionalisation schemes", they are the basis of the names in those systems.Skookum1 (talk) 04:05, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
                • Being created from a traditional name may help roughly identify the location of an area, but having similar names does not mean that the name conveys a coherent sense of what area is involved. When the same name things to different people in different people in different times and contexts, it doesn't make for the sort of coherent geography which creates stable categories.
                  This sort of information is much better conveyed in lists, which can explain the scope being used for that purpose, and identify topics which fall in one definition of the region but not another.
                  (BTW, thank you for repeatedly acknowledging that I assume good faith. My assumption throughout has been that these categories were created in good faith, but on the basis of a regional structure which may be too ill-defined to be objective). --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 10:04, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge/Delete per nom and discussion. Lesser Cartographies (talk) 20:50, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Seems to me this discussion has gone off on too many tangents to be a cohesive proposal anymore. But at one point BrownHaired Girl says: There are 2 questions here. First, is there a consensus to start categorising landforms by physical geography? Some outliers have been identified, but in general that is not how they are done. Secondly, to make a viable category structure, the geographical units need to be stable, defined and widely used.

This is only one question and strikes me as somewhat confused. There is a set of widely used, general purpose regions of British Columbia. They have names like Sunshine Coast, Okanagan, Cariboo, Chilcotin, and so on. They are "stable" and "defined", but you will not find a single definitive source that defines them because there is no authority with the power to make such definitions. The exact definitions can vary slightly from source to source. I see no problem with that. Are these regions of "physical geography"? Yes and no. They are mostly derived from physical geography—British Columbia's physical geography imposes itself on pretty much everything in the province, including human culture. A region name like "Okanagan" conjures up a specific area in terms of physical geography as well as various cultural characteristics.

So on the question of whether we should categorize landforms by physical geography?, I would say we want to categorize them by regions like Okanagan, Cariboo, Boundary, Haida Gwaii, etc. Whether these regions are "physical geography" or not seems beside the point. They are the basic, most well-known and widely used regions of British Columbia. What else would one use?

In the United States landforms are often grouped into political regions such as states and counties. This is understandable since states and counties are precisely defined, well known, and widely used. Sometimes people look for something similar to use in British Columbia. BC does not have counties but it does have "regional districts" and people sometimes think they are "like counties" and can be used for "precisely defined and well known" regions the way US counties are used. But while regional districts may be precisely defined—although less stable than US counties—they are not as well known and widely used as the "physical" regions I talked about above. There are other problems with using regional districts like US counties, but I'm trying to keep this as short as I can.

If there is a second question it seems to be "are these regions stable, defined and widely used?" To that I would say, about the regions Okanagan, Cariboo, etc, "yes". If you want regional definitions that are perfectly definitive and official, then no. There simply is no set of BC regions that are both well known, widely used and precisely defined. Yet the province is truly gigantic. For many topics we need to break it up into regions. Rivers, for example—there are hundreds if not thousands of rivers in British Columbia. It seems to me the real question here is what you care about more, precisely defined regions that are less well known and used, or well known and widely used regions that are a little fuzzy. For me there is no question. I shudder at the thought of categorizing landforms by regional district, and I can't think of any other non-obscure set of "official" and "precisely defined" regions.

  • Interjection As already explained (and ignored) farther up this discussion, there are several other systems of "official" and "precisely defined" regionalization, as per the headings in the top section of {{Subdivisions of British Columbia}}. Many, such a MoF (Ministry of Forests) regions/districts are effectively more potent and more citable for geography and scientific resarch than the regional districts, who have no power over 95% of the landscape of the province, though they do have boundaries; but so do Health regions and Environment regions and also Category:Ecozones and ecoregions of British Columbia (Ecozones are federally-defined, ecoregions are kinda NGO stuff, though Biogeoclimatic zones of British Columbia is an MoF map). Tourism regions, environment/parks regions, forest districts.....these all play an equally prominent role in the political geography of BC as regional districts do, and then some. Such-and-so a mountain in the remote and vast Omineca Mountains is not well-described or located by placing it in the Regional District of Kitimat-Stikine or another RD. The natural/historical regions that as you note have been defined and cultivated by the history of the province and mandated by its geography are very obvious to anyone who actually knows the place. And in'st just firing potshots from abroad pointing at conventions and guidelines that don't exist, and if they did, are not applicable in BC and need revision. The convention about counties in the UK and US is all fine and dandy; Counties of British Columbia are court system regions btw......Skookum1 (talk) 06:32, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Re: Forest regions, health regions, etc, yes, that's why I said "non-obscure"—although one might argue that regional districts are also "obscure". Pfly (talk) 07:19, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Anyway, I've already written more than I wanted to. I apologize but I couldn't see how to say all this more succinctly. A final point: This topic of categorizing rivers by "well known but not perfectly defined regions" seems similar to Category:Rivers of Southern California. Everyone knows what Southern California is, more or less. And since California is such a big state and its counties rather messy, it makes sense to group landforms not just by counties but by larger regions, like Southern California. Yet Southern California#Northern boundary of Southern California points out how "Southern California" is not a formal designation and definitions vary. I'd argue that people disagree far more over what Southern California is than any of the main regions of British Columbia. Pfly (talk) 06:18, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment Many people thought about this issue, not just here. I do like the deWiki approach, of geographically categorizing rivers from their basin to their source so that the river/lake always is categorized by its outflow. As a second category tree they use river in entity where they use the entity that holds the complete river. The idea of categorising by boundary ranges was rejected there Agathoclea (talk) 11:23, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reply The by-outflow system is used on titles such as List of British Columbia rivers but would not work well for categorization purposes in BC due to the close relationship between individual rivers and particular inlets and also the close relationship between the regions and both rivers and mountains and the definitions of mountain ranges in terms of those rivers;
      • Point of information per the scale of the areas disputed, the whole of what had been West Germany is about the same size, or less, than the Interior Plateau: West Germany was 248,577 km², an estimate from govt mapping systems for the Interior Plateau is 215,549.3 km² (calculated using the area-measure tool within BC Basemap which is launched by the start button here and that's just a rough outline from eyeballing the map on the wikipedia page and from my own knowledge of its rough outline; Vancouver Island was often historically equated to England, though it is actually smaller 31,285 km2 vs. England's 130,395 km2.; even Ireland is bigger at 84,421 km2. BUT none of England, Germany or Ireland have the same incredible density of untrammeled mountain systems or are so defined and shaped by rivers and mountain ranges,. or the number of rivers, major and minor, nor are their topographies and regions so tied to terrain and riverine systems as is BC; nor is any other Canadian province, for that matter (Yukon is mostly the upper basin of the Yukon River).
      • Point of all that is that what was suitable for Germany or the UK or, say, Australia, is not remotely equatable to the geographic and hydrographic realities of BC; I can see why not in Germany because, well, there are only so many streams in the Hartz of the Schwabische Alb (sp?) or the German Alps; and comparisons to other montane regions like the Urals and Caucasus do not apply because they lack the rivers that are a major feature of BC geography and history.
      • This is why one "global standard" for categorization cannot apply; systems that are relevant in one country/region are not relevant in another. And BC political geography is inherently structured so as to prevent the emergence of strong/autonomous regional governance; one very big reason the regional district system was invented (in only 1966-1967) was for Victoria (meaning the provincial government) to maintain centralized control of rural/non-municipal areas under the aegis of different ministries with different regionalization systems; centralized truly regional governance is unknown in BC:
        • the Okanagan, one of the major regions of the Interior, has three different regional districts; but it is one region;
        • the Skeena-Queen Charlotte and Kitimat-Stikine regional districts were separated from each other in the RD system, not for geographic reasons, but because Terrace and Kitimat didn't like Prince Rupert having all the clout; and the latter RD was recently expanded to include the Telegraph Creek area, which used to be in the 'unorganized' Stikine Region, which has no municipalities and only 1,352 inhabitants (data from that page is old, from 2004; with Telegraph Creek and Dease Lake now removed from it (only a few years ago), more like 1000, if that, mostly in Atlin); and despite its name doesn't include most of the Stikine River basin; "Rivers of the Stikine Region" would be totally misleading because it wouldn't even have the Stikine River in it.
          • Similar to that absurdity of nomenclature; the Northern Rockies Regional District includes some of the Northern Rockies but is mostly incredibly flat prairie and swamp; the Peace River Regional District has a population focused on the prairie region of northeastern BC, but includes more of the Northern Rockies and areas west of that range, which are mostly uninhabited; "Peace River" in terms of the most common usage of that phrase in regional sense, which is in Wikipedia as the Peace River Country, is not associated with mountains at all.
        • Other RDs have been regularly reshaped and new ones made up; the Regional District of Mount Waddington is new, as is the Fraser Valley Regional District (which used to be the eastern parts of the Central Fraser Valley Regional District and Dewdney-Alouette Regional District (the western parts are now in the expanded GVRD) the Fraser-Cheam Regional District; and recently the City of Abbotsford, the largest in the FVRD, withdrew from it in a dispute over a water supply dispute with the RD and with the District of Mission. The Regional District of Central Kootenay is also new, as is that phrase "Central Kootenay" for what is customarily called the West Kootenay (one of the 'historical/traditional regions; that the nom of this has challenged the very existence of wiki-articles for....
      • There is no real equivalent to the county systems found elsewhere; governance in BC is tiered and multi-ministry in law and practice; the only "fixed" system is that created by the Lands Acts, the Land Districts of British Columbia, which have no part in governance, only in survey descriptions and in geographic cataloguing as already noted.
      • I mention the Stikine Region's population because it includes the northern half of BC's part of the Boundary Ranges; the southern half is in the RD of Kitimat-Stikine, neither are useful categorization parameters in a country (here in the BC sense of the word, meaning landscape/terrain/region) that is dominantly uninhabitable mountainscape (a good deal of it under heavy glaciation, in fact, as with the rest of the Coast Mountains); the Boundary Ranges are the cradle and birthplace of these rivers; the Stikine and Taku arise on the plateaus of the same names but pierce the range very dramatically through gigantic canyon-like maws (as do the Homathko and Fraser farther south in teh Pacific Ranges); the southern boundary of the Boundary Ranges is the Nass, t he northern/northwestern is the Kelsall. The Boundary Ranges, like the Omineca Mountains, are defined by rivers; to not categorize them that way, but point to some distantly-contrived geometry concocted for administration-from-a-distance in an area where no one lives, would be not very workable....or relevant.Skookum1 (talk) 14:39, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Question: Is not every river (and stream, creek, brook, etc) a tributary of another water body, ultimately ending up at an ocean?

For example, the Little River is a tributary of the Cariboo River, which is a tributary of the Quesnel River, which is a tributary of the Fraser River, which flows into the Strait of Georgia. Indeed, there exists a category called Fraser River, which contains a category called Tributaries of the Fraser River.

So it seems there already exists two methods of categorization in use for BC rivers, by tributary and by political boundaries. Gjs238 (talk) 15:43, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Reply No, not by political boundaries; ntw there are three Little Rivers in BC, the other two being one on Vancouver Island, entering the Strait of Georgia near Comox and the other in the Shuswap Country, connecting Shuswap Lake to Little Shuswap Lake). The one you're talking about is wholly within the Cariboo region, which is not a political subdivision, though that name is used for various regionalization schemes (Cariboo Forest District or Region, Cariboo Regional District). It is in a landform known as the Quesnel Highland, which also includes the Cariboo goldfields towns, and is commonly considered part of the Cariboo Plateau, though some reckonings place the Quesnel Highland as part of the Cariboo Mountains rather than the Cariboo Plateau.
  • Comment Recently I typed "Category:Rivers of the Alps, expecting that to be a redlink; it's not, it has existed as a category since 2008, created by User:Eleassar and has had both User:Good Olfactory and User:Obiwankenobi work on it since; so they obviously had no problem with classifying rivers by mountain ranges. The subcategory Category:Rivers of the Julian Alps was also created by Eleassar in 2008.Skookum1 (talk) 16:22, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete (do not merge) all subcategories, Delete container category, but keep container category talk page for discussion of what regions might be used. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:33, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    Reasoning: Even those subcategories which correspond to a more-or-less well-defined region do not appear to have coherent inclusion criteria. Does it mean rivers whose source is in the specified region, rivers whose mouth is in the specified region, or rivers which flow in the specified region. (If the latter, it's not appropriate for diffusing, as a single river might appear in many categories.) It's not clear that the criteria for inclusion in the named subcategories is the same as that in categories for the region; if not, a merge would not be appropriate except where the article was moved from Category:X to Category:Rivers of X. However, the parent category (Category:Rivers of British Columbia) is potentially large enough to need diffusion, so discussion of what categorization should be used needs to be somewhere. If there were a single classification system commonly used for rivers by region, then a categorization like this could be used. (Whether it should be used might be left to regional experts, but no evidence has been provided that this system is not WP:OR and not in violation of the specificity provision of WP:Categorization#Articles.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:33, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Observation: Containing three subcategories (not including the category under question) it would seem that Category:Rivers of British Columbia is already in the process of diffusion. Gjs238 (talk) 19:25, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Reply There is no "single classification system" for river categories; and I really have no idea what you mean by "It's not clear that the criteria for inclusion in the named subcategories is the same as that in categories for the region"....other than few I've added (articles I mean) that were not already in the categories, all items were in the parent categories - which are named for mountain ranges and islands, not rivers, though they are definitely within those regions, e.g. Category:Boundary Ranges, Category:Pacific Ranges, Category:Vancouver Island, Category:Cariboo; Vancouver Island, Haida Gwaii, Cariboo, Okanagan, the Lower Mainland are all geographic regions BC and recognizably used and named as such, as are the North Coast, the Central Coast, the Chilcotin and more; they are not political units; but as explained in detail above, there are no viable political units that are useful. So what do you mean by "criteria for inclusion in the named subcategories is [maybe not] the same as that in categories for the region"? How can geographic objects in a region not be in that region's category hierarchy??
      • As for your "Whether it should be used might be left to regional experts...etc", I guess you might have gathered that the above exegesis demonstrates my expertise in BC geography (other than the areas cited, it was written straight off the top of my head from intimate familiarity with BC geography, history and toponymy), and other Canadian Wikipedians, even ones who don't like me, will attest to the thoroughness of that body of knowledge that I have contributed en masse into Wikipedia from the very first days of my joining this strange place.
      • And re "but no evidence has been provided that this system is not WP:OR".....well, that was discussed at length long ago, somewhere in CANTALK or WikiProjectBC archives now, and as noted by User:Pfly above, it's a useful and recognizable system for 'breaking down BC', and there really is no other. Consensus stood by these groupings/regions and I don't mean "consensus by silence". User:Qyd and others who were around then were among those who not just took part in such discussions, but added to the region articles and also added maps and made additions of articles to the categories. And the cynicism I'm hearing belies the reality that not one of the deletionists here has provided any evidence that these region-names ARE original research......the onus should be on on the nom to provide such proof, as I have been often told in RMs and other CfDs..... not to call all proof to the opposite "irrelevant" (probably without even reading it). It's AGF to pretend that consensus discussions did not take place, whether about the region-titles or the categories derived from them. And those discussions took place among Canadian Wikipedians who are aware of the context, and others from the Pacific Northwest who frequented BC titles, because of our shared histories and shared geography (including Pfly but not him alone).
      • What I'm getting here is people from wiki-land who only want to talk about guidelines and cast aspersions on long-standing citable titles and on this long-dedicated wiki-scribe as if he were not trustworthy or had, as the OR allegation implies, created FICTION. I'm not a fringe theorist about any of this, though that's what's being implied...with my intelligence and honesty and dedication denigrated (not by you, but by this very CfD, which wasn't exactly "innocent" in its origin, and was half-baked and now reaching far outside the box since its start; bulk CfDs are maybe n the same category as bulk RMs, i.e. procedural oppose material; especially when they reach across different kinds of categories and subcategories.....but I've learned the hard way that one rule invoked against something I've created or proposed is not necessarily going to apply to others.....
      • I will look at WP:Categorization#Articles in the morning, it is coming up on 1:15 am here and I've just created a few dozen geography articles, but I will remind you of the FIFTHPILLAR "there are no rules" and that COMMONNAME and RECOGNIZABLE and more apply to all of the categories now being challenged as OR in their entirety. Systems that aapply in Ohio and Bavaria and England do not or even elsewhere in Canada do not apply to BC, and cannot because of the very unique and complex nature of the province's topography and its close connection to our history and to the different regional identities and self-perceptions within the province. Ditching these categories would mean wiping away 150 years of usage as if it did not exist, all because of some guideline written narrowly (if so, I have yet to read it and examine its details) by people who have no experience of a place "spoken of, not without a touch of horror, as a sea of mountains" (don't know where the author of In the Sea of Sterile Mountains got that quote from but it's stuck with me for years) nor any familiarity with its geographically-defined history and common terminologies.
      • Any other categorization system you might propose using political geographic boundaries WOULD be original research, because there are not the sources to establish and place articles in such categorization systems; you are recommending the deletion of categories based in citable reality and replacing it with SYNTH which will require OR to accomplish; and knowing as I do from the amount of work put into the categories and their hundreds/thousands of articles so far, there's no one equipped or willing or able to do such a preposterous and difficult-to-research task. Is regional expertise (including knowing what cites there are and where to find them) so easily ditchable in the name of some guideline concocted by people whose imagination can't grapple with the landscape of British Columbia and its complexities and very in-your-face realities?
      • I can cite all these categories and their titles/contexts, and also give citations for which region (or mountain range) they're in......but can you find citations which will identify rivers by what e.g. regional district they're in? Those are no more relevant, geographically-speaking, than anything else on {{Subdivisions of British Columbia}} or listed at Outline of British Columbia; and applying them would be original research - and also take one *HELL""* of a lot of work....and I don't see the nom here, or you yourself, or either of the other "support delete" voters, likely to undertake such a gargantuan undertaking anytime soon...or having the ability or knowledge to even know where to begin, for that matter.....Skookum1 (talk) 18:45, 21 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Granular materials[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: restrict and rename as Category:Granularity of materials. – Fayenatic London 19:24, 18 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Virtually any solid can be granulated.Project Osprey (talk) 08:32, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep Seems reasonably well-defined as a high-level container category.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 15:32, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nom; the various category entries really have little to do with one another: sugar and Pulse (legume)? A sugar is a crystal at room temperature, but a large sugar crystal can be granulated at room temperature and put in one's coffee. At high temperatures, sugar is some form of viscous liquid (just overcook some to see) and is certainly not "granular" in any common meaning of the term. Pulses are the seeds of various plants often used as foods (Lima beans, chickpeas, etc.) and when presented as this:

appear granular, but presented as this:

so do cars and people. 'nuff said. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:00, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I note that we have a head article at Granular material, so any debates about whether this exists as a category of materials should be addressed by that article. It's possible it needs to be purged, but as a category it should remain. (Note: I moved the image to the right for better formatting).--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:05, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I feel that the definition is arbitrary, in so much that any solid can be ground-up into small particles, at which point it will behave like a granular material. It's not really an intrinsic property, just something which has or can be done to it. In that regard I feel it's WP:NOTDEFINING, although I might simply be splitting hairs here. Project Osprey (talk) 18:37, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
True, any solid COULD become a granular material, but the category is for articles about materials that are granular. The article has a quote that states "Granular materials are ubiquitous in nature and are the second-most manipulated material in industry (the first one is water)". It seems this categorization is used by materials scientists and there seems to be a well-defined inclusion criteria. I think if we were to limit ourselves to technical literature that discussed some of these elements the fact that they are granular would indeed be defining.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:05, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Granular materials are a class of materials studied by physicists; they have properties different from solids or liquids and some of those properties are universal across different types of granular material. Some topics, like Gravel and Sand, are granular materials by definition, but may vary in composition. Really, it is no different in character than Category:Solids or Category:Liquids and is just as valid for organizing our topics. --Mark viking (talk) 22:21, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. This is "categorisation by overly-broad shared characteristic"; grouping sand, gravel, sugar, and legumes isn't a useful categorisation to the Wikipedia reader. - The Bushranger One ping only 02:21, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
But materials scientists DO group such materials together, for specific reasons.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 14:48, 22 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep' and consider renaming to "Materials that can be purchased by the (dry) peck". All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 21:33, 18 April 2014 (UTC).[reply]
  • keep as a natural part of its parent and siblings in Category:Materials and it has a article of the same name. Hmains (talk) 19:45, 19 April 2014 (UTC) And with 8 subcategories and 55 direct articles. If this were deleted, these would have to go directly into Category:Materials which will certainly a negative in terms of helpful navigation to articles--the purpose for which categories exist. Hmains (talk) 20:03, 19 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Restrict the category to exclude articles about substances (e.g. sugar and perlite) that are sometimes in granular form, to exclude large things (e.g. icebergs) and to exclude things like Pulse (legume) (if you cut a bean in half it's no longer a bean, unlike gravel etc). If that is unworkable then restrict the category even further - just to articles about the physics of granules (e.g. Granular convection). DexDor (talk) 07:03, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • All that does is keep the same collection of articles, just under a different heading. With respect, I'm not really sure that's helpful. Project Osprey (talk) 22:32, 1 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep @Project Osprey: So do we delete Atom because everything is constitued of atoms or we delete Combuastion because everything can undergo to combustion, and so on? If every solid can be granular material this does not mean in fact that they are granular material: you need to crush them and they don't have to stick together, so no, not every solid are or can be granular material. --Daniele Pugliesi (talk) 12:43, 1 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not every solid, but certainly a huge number them. According to the category's description this can include icebergs, yet snow is also listed. I think BrownHairedGirl's idea is a good one - we keep a category which groups pages discussing the properties of granules. I could see that category being useful. Otherwise we're just tying to list everything which is granular and I doubt that would be of much use to anyone. After all, categories are supposed to be a search aid, not just lists. Project Osprey (talk) 22:32, 1 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Anti-intellectualists[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete. Good Ol’factory (talk) 01:45, 25 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Delete. An obvious POV and BLPvio magnet, and pretty much inherently controversial. As a general rule, it's bad form to have a category whose very name is listed as a "pejorative term for people". FiredanceThroughTheNight (talk) 00:54, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:OC#SUBJECTIVE. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:20, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete seems mostly to be used as a category to critique other groups. My question is, how did this survive so long? I don't recall coming across it...--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 15:33, 17 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. The OP spells it out very well why. - The Bushranger One ping only 02:22, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment while I have no opinion as to whether this is a useful category, certainly it would seem that Pol Pot is a valid member. If there are other notable subjects where the categorization is as clear cut, then perhaps this isn't so crazy after all. All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 21:36, 18 April 2014 (UTC).[reply]
  • Delete -- This is an ATTACK category that does not necessarily apply to all those within subcats. Most are unpleasant movements, but may have had intellectuals within their own mindset. In some cases this is the rejection of the West in favour of something else. I suspect that the Taliban value Islamic scholarship, for example, while rejecting much else. Peterkingiron (talk) 21:54, 20 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Any category that groups people guilty of mass murder with those who advocate their policies reasonably, is very problematic. This is a horrible attack category, at least as bad as the one we just deleted with treated the SPLC as the arbitrator of truth.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:24, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete, lacks objective criteria for inclusion. Bishonen | talk 08:05, 23 April 2014 (UTC).[reply]
  • Delete Per nom and Obiwankenobi. Cheers, LindsayHello 11:21, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy delete per G10, maybe salt. 108.216.22.69 (talk) 21:19, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
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