Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Unhexseptium

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete all. kur ykh 00:42, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unhexseptium

Contested prods regarding a series of formulaic articles about undiscovered elements. Other articles in the series includes:

Delete as per Wikipedia is not a crystal ball's explicit ban against articles on predetermined systematic pattern of names that have been pre-assigned to future events or discoveries. Allen3 ^talk 10:00, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep WP:CRYSTAL says: "Certain scientific extrapolations, such as chemical elements documented by IUPAC, before isolation in the laboratory, are usually considered encyclopedic." I've checked the history and it appears to be a longstanding exception. I'd say there's good reason for it, because it's not mere speculation, it's documented with scientific evidence. - Mgm|^(talk) 11:11, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Something went wrong. I could've sworn I had at least one hit when I did a page search on these elements. I blame it on the computer ;) - Mgm|^(talk) 23:43, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm not aware IUPAC has documented any of these elements. Scientific evidence is only given for elements 170-173, and it's nothing specific to a single element. It would be better placed on Period 9 element.--Roentgenium111 (talk) 18:28, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - I agree with Roentgenium and invited those !voting keep based on the WP:CRYSTAL exception to reconsider. These elements have definitely not been documented by IUPAC on anyone else. There may be some confusion as to what is meant by the term "documented". In the context of chemistry, it doesn't mean simply "hypothesized", but rather more like "observed". With transuranics, typically they have been observed in miniscule amounts for fractions of a second (in say atom-smashing experiments) before they are ever isolated (i.e. put in a bottle in relatively a pure state.) And that's the distinction the exception is drawing. Now, I wasn't around when this exception was written, but that's the only scientifically plausible interpretation especially in light of the hurricane example discussed immediately prior to it. Yilloslime (t) 02:27, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy keep articles with a specific exception in the relevant guideline have a pretty clear consensus to remain. If you want to dispute the consensus of the guideline, I'd suggest you should do so on the guideline's talk page, and then bring these back here if a change is made. JulesH (talk) 11:46, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as per above; Wikipedia is not a crystal ball specifically names this instance as an exception to the rule. There is no other reason to delete these. Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 12:09, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete - a misconception has been formed (partly my fault) that these elements have been documented by the IUPAC, when infact they have not. WP:CRYSTAL does not have an exception for non-documented IUPAC elements. I would also be in favor of creating a list of 'IUPAC placeholder names' if enough references exist. Sorry for the confusion, Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 15:10, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - I'm surprised any explanation is even needed, but discussed in good sources. Wily D 14:35, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Speedy keep articles, as per above. Jll (talk) 17:35, 15 January 2009 (UTC) As they have not been been documented by IUPAC, the exemption discussed in the WP:CRYSTAL policy does not apply. Jll (talk) 00:22, 17 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as the article contains only boilerplate material and no sources. I think it was already decided some time ago that articles on undiscovered elements should be deleted unless there is anything to say about them.--Roentgenium111 (talk) 18:22, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Keep all. WP:CRYSTAL has an explicit exception for these articles. Upon review of the policy, these are not exempt. Thanks to Tim Vickers for the note about this. -Atmoz (talk) 19:10, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Strongly keep as these are the interesting articles I just created yesterday. These articles contain some predictions based on their periodic trends, such as electron configurations, electrons per shell, chemical reactivities, chemical series, and presumed phase of matter. The atomic mass for these elements come from the Apsidium website.--BlueEarth (talk | contribs) 19:48, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I think that in near future, the extended periodic table may become even more important as scientists will develop more theories about the properties for all 218 or more elements including elements 167-173 and write papers about those theories. BlueEarth (talk | contribs) 20:46, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - Wikipedia's No original research policy requires that the existence of scientific theories precedes the existence of the Wikipedia article. Uncle G (talk) 04:59, 18 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - this article covers a placeholder, temporary name. Why not just create a single article called List of IUPAC Placeholder Element Names and cover them in that article/list. The reader will be confused by including the regular infobox when most of the information for this still undiscovered element is not known. Presumably, someone will eventually discover it in a laboratory, but it will be so unstable that we may never measure any of its physical or chemical properties, so the infobox will always been unfilled. However, the discoverer will propose a name (e.g., Wikipedium) and that name will become permanent when adopted by IUPAC and other international standard organizations. Racepacket (talk) 23:47, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy delete the viability of elements beyond 139 is pure speculation, since chemical properties depend on electrons, and the 138/139 articles state that they are the very last possible elements in chemistry. 76.66.198.171 (talk) 00:44, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment There is a probability that the most stable isotope of unhexseptium (predicted to be Uhs-460) is speculated to have a very long half-life of 1.7 × 10¹⁵ years, which can practically be stable. Elements from 168-172 is speculated to have stable isotopes and element 173 has a half-life of 96.42 days for the most stable isotope (Ust-477). --BlueEarth (talk | contribs) 00:56, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: Do you have references for these bold statements???--Roentgenium111 (talk) 16:43, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - These speculations about their stabilities are unreferenced. However, their atomic masses are referenced, which come from the Apsidium website, which list general properties for all 226 elements, which has more elements than the extended periodic table of 218 elements on Wikipedia. BlueEarth (talk | contribs) 21:46, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy delete. These elements have not been "documented by IUPAC" at all; these articles are pure speculation, unsourced of course, as is so often the case. They were presumably added to raise the profile of the site apsidium.com, liked in all the articles. Physchim62 (talk) 01:06, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Very emphatic. --Mr Accountable (talk) 01:59, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Without countering the reasoning that anything said about these elements would be original research, because science has not documented them, however "emphatic" you are you won't make an argument for keeping. Uncle G (talk) 04:59, 18 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all - a reasonable exception to the rule. Bearian (talk) 02:05, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That is only if one ignores one of the other rules at the same time. It isn't within Wikipedia's remit as an encyclopaedia of existing knowledge to document new elements that are currently unknown to science. Uncle G (talk) 04:59, 18 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Delete. Contrary to many !keep votes, this element is most definitely not covered by the exception in noted in WP:CRYSTAL, as it has not been documented by IUPAC. This is more analogous to the hurricane example cited in item of CRYSTAL: "Individual items from a predetermined list or a systematic pattern of names, pre-assigned to future events or discoveries, are not suitable article topics, if only generic information is known about the item. Lists of tropical cyclone names is encyclopedic; "Tropical Storm Alberto (2012)" is not, even though it is virtually certain that a storm of that name will occur in the North Atlantic and will turn counterclockwise." We know what this element will likely be provisionally named if it's ever observed, but so far it hasn't been observed, and, as there are only 8 googlehits for the term[1] it seems no one is even doing theoretical on "unhexseptium." (This would also suggest this article is mostly original research). List of hypothesized transuranic elements might be encyclopedic, but individual articles such as this one are not. Yilloslime (t) 02:14, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete can't we just have an unlimited number of these not-yet-discovered/created elements? Some limit has to apply here? The current majoritarian theory says Z=210 is the limit on nuclear stability, so we get another bunch of articles - and what does the loyal opposition thoerize? no limit perhaps? aha, we'll be on our way to our 10,000,000th article right away. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 02:34, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
NOTE: The IUPAC website link at this page has a link "IUPAC Atomic Weights" to this page which has information on the listed elements. So it is actually documented. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:34, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, and that page lists precisely six elements with temporary names which can be said to be documented by IUPAC, numbers 112–116 and 118. It has no information on the elements listed here, elements 167–173: pure, undocumented crystal-ball material. All seven articles are virtual word-for-for word identical to each other, with a "Significance" [sic] section in four of them which is cribbed from Encyclopaedia Britannica, and which points out that it may well be impossible to ever produce them. Physchim62 (talk) 11:02, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Strong delete, and possibly redirect to Systematic element name. Absolutely nothing can be said about these elements which isn't complete speculation. Not even that they can possibly exist. No-one is sure about whether elements with atomic numbers > 137 can exist (see Untriseptium). This is even worse than the "Tropical Storm Alberto (2012)" example on WP:NOT, given that at least we can be reasonably confident that such a storm will exist. Note that no element from 140 to 166 has its article. -- Army1987 – Deeds, not words. 11:20, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science-related deletion discussions. -- Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 15:14, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Don't forget that 26.4% of all statistics are made up on the spot (including this one) Physchim62 (talk) 17:14, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all, I can find no reliable sources that discuss these elements, so Wikipedia cannot have articles on them. Tim Vickers (talk) 17:16, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. I removed the PRODs from these because it wasn't clear to me that these weren't topics of legitimate theoretical research interest and thought they deserved wider discussion, but it seems pretty clear now that there aren't reliable sources that we know of to base these articles on.--ragesoss (talk) 20:05, 16 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Either WP:MADEUP or just based on an unreliable website. --Itub (talk) 15:33, 17 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep but merge all of them together on Transuranium elements or something and redirect these names there, since people might be looking for them, there are reliable sources (see links) and it's encyclopedic info, so we might as well make them a bluelink. They also have much repeated info, which is shouting for a merge, compare with Ununpentium which has a lot of info on how people is searching for it.

Links: Recommendations for the naming of elements with atomics numbers greater than 100 in 1978 "Elements of atomic numbers greater than 103 are often referred to in the scientific literature but receive names only after they have been 'discovered' " One of the names, Unseptnilium, appears listed there for #170. The only two hits on google scholar are the two versions of that paper recommending names. Unnilseptium appears on several scholar papers [2].

One thing: these still-non-existing names are making its way into other articles like the extended periodic table [3] as if they had been already discovered, which is a very good reason to cut this here and now. They need to be distinguished somehow from the rest of elements (maybe an asterik at the side of the name, or making a separate table below). --Enric Naval (talk) 15:16, 19 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep but merge all of them together per Enric Naval, above, seems like a fine idea to me. Otherwise, I'll certainly go with Delete. Tim Ross (talk) 18:07, 19 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep all and strong keep Unseptnilium, as it has special chemical significance. Unseptnilium, too, is mentioned by IUPAC: [4]. And, guys, what about the rest of the undiscovered elements? These aren't the only ones. The extended periodic table has more elements, including the g-block elements - a block whose existence has not even been confirmed! Are all of those going to be nominated for deletion too? I hope not, as I would vote keep on them as well.Bsimmons666 (talk) 02:12, 20 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep and Merge per EnricNaval and reference. --Deadly∀ssassin 05:24, 20 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Which reference? The IUPAC article that basically teaches how to count (i.e., how to make up a name for any arbitrary element)? By that logic we should have an article on three million seventy thousand four hundred and thirty-two because there are books that teach how to make up names for numbers. --Itub (talk) 13:49, 20 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all very poorly sourced; seem to be almost entirely OR and speculation. Gandalf61 (talk) 13:39, 20 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.