RationalWiki:Articles for deletion/Category:Pseudohistorians

Category:Pseudohistorians | Result: Moved to Category:Pseudohistory promoters

Category:Pseudohistorians (edit|talk|history|protect|delete|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Delete

1. It was created today by ScepticWombat (talk · contribs · block  · rights  · rename) , who has put in it the people previously in Category:Pseudohistory. I really don't like the name - "pseudohistorian" would be someone who explicitly claims to be an historian without bein one, so it is not an appropriate label for all of the people currently listed in the category. ZooGuard (talk) 11:25, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
2. I think the category is useful but the name is bad. Maybe "pseudohistory promoters", like "Category:pseudoscience promoters"? αδελφός ΓυζζγςατΡοτατο (talk/stalk) 12:31, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   That would be a better formulation, yes.--ZooGuard (talk) 14:39, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

Keep

1. Keep, possibly as "pseudohistory promoters". Though I see nothing whatsoever wrong with the present name - note it's the name of the corresponding Wikipedia category, for example - David Gerard (talk) 14:52, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   I voted delete because you can't move (rename) categories like articles, at least not without WP's category direct recategorization bot. αδελφός ΓυζζγςατΡοτατο (talk/stalk) 15:00, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

2. I created the category based on the example of Thomas DiLorenzo who was tagged as a historian, despite having no qualifications while all of his "historical" writings (or at least those he is known for) are in pseudohistory territory - David Irving is another good example. It's no odder to have a separate category for pseudohistorians and one for pseudohistory than the ones for historians/history - hence why I copied the templates from the latter into the former. That's also why I haven't moved all the names from the pseudohistory category into pseudohistorians. For instance, I left out Don McLeroy and Murray Rothbard who are not known for writing pseudohistory (I removed Alan Dershowitz because I didn't recognise him as one who pushes pseudohistory at all). Pseudohistorian and historian are not to be viewed as mutually exclusive categories (you can be a trained historian who has gone off the deep end and support all kinds of pseudohistory - a sort of parallel to the Nobel disease. For instance, Peter James is tagged as both a historian and pseudohistorian). The downside of choosing "pseudohistorian" over "pseudohistory promoter" is that, apparently, some readers here seem to interpret the former as someone who lacks any relevant credentials. The problem with the "pseudohistory promoter", I think, is that it could include those who simply push other people's crankery. ScepticWombat (talk) 15:33, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   A historian is a person who researches & writes about history, not necessarily a member of a university's history faculty nor somebody with a qualification in history as an academic field. ₩€₳$€£ΘĪÐ^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 17:03, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   I disagree - that would at most be an amateur historian, for instance I don't think those who research their family tree qualify as historians. Similarly, researching and writing about science doesn't (necessarily) make you a scientist (this description would fit a science journalist, for instance). ScepticWombat (talk) 17:33, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   Somebody who publishes books on history, including family histories, can reasonably be described as a historian. If they research stuff in their spare time for their own interest only, they can be described as an amateur historian. Neither of these is defined by qualifications. Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 18:37, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   I still disagree - just like publishing books on science doesn't necessarily make you a scientist, publishing books on history doesn't necessarily make you a historian. ScepticWombat (talk) 18:51, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   Ummm, this is actually one of the reasons I dislike differentiating it into a separate category - even if it's intended to contain only a subset of the people in the main category, it's very easy for some well-meaning category-cleaner to interpret it as "people related to pseudohistory go in this subcategory" and move everyone there, rendering moot any careful per-case deliberations about applying the label. Like every wiki, RW has its share of template-diddlers and obsessive reorganizers.--ZooGuard (talk) 17:35, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   By that line of reasoning, we should also start removing all those in the historians category into the history one. Either there's a point in having separate categories for a topic and its practitioners, or we might as well start deleting all "practitioner categories". Starting to make such extremely broad "catch-all categories" just because some editor might not understand such distinctions is not, I think, a particularly strong argument for dispensing with subtlety because nothing is ever foolproof. ScepticWombat (talk) 18:51, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   No, that's not valid. Most of our categories about a pseudoscience have a related "people who do this pseudoscience" category. The "pseudohistorians" category seems like it's that category; people will move articles. In comparison, the historians category is clearly delineated on specialty. FuzzyCatPotato™ (talk/stalk) 19:48, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   "In comparison, the historians category is clearly delineated on specialty." Not according to the broad definition used by Weaseloid above it's not... ScepticWombat (talk) 20:31, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

   Any historian, regardless of experience, can be categorized based on their primary subject. FuzzyDogPotato (talk/stalk) 20:34, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

Goat

• I thought about whether Marija Gimbutas should be tagged as a historian. Strictly speaking, she was an archaeologist, but I thought about tagging her as historian+pseudohistorian to emphasise her legitimate degree and work in conjunction with her crankery. Any ideas? ScepticWombat (talk) 15:50, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

• 3 people for renaming so far, 1 for not. (Just noting.) FuzzyCatPotato™ (talk/stalk) 02:32, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
• Make that 4 people for renaming. I think it should be "Pseudohistory promoters" and the category should include people who came up with the nutty ideas as well as cranks who've promoted them without coming up with any new ones of their own. Just because Wikipedia does it one way doesn't mean that we can't do it better. Spud (talk) 03:10, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
• 5 people for renaming. I like the name "Psudohistory promoters" for the category, and think that the category is useful.Make haste slowly (talk) 06:00, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

The majority wants renaming; I'll do so. FüzzyCätPötätö (talk/stalk) 16:48, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Done. 32℉uzzy, 0℃atPotato (talk/stalk) 17:14, 4 June 2015 (UTC)