Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Competent man

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 no consensus. (Non-administrator closure) NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 15:12, 14 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Competent man

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Apparent original research. It reads like a misplaced TV Tropes entry, has been tagged as {{unreferenced}} since 2006 (!) without getting a single source, and I can find no reliable sources - the sources I can find all seem to be a result of citogenesis. Kolbasz (talk) 11:44, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep A competent man knows how to find sources such as The Heritage of Heinlein or Harlan Ellison: The Edge of Forever. Andrew (talk) 12:26, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
delete - agree that it seems like original research. Completely unreferenced article. No citations for the long list of names in the article as well. Parabolooidal (talk) 15:37, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:44, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:45, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep but definitely improve. It's weak as is.Mzmadmike (talk) 21:58, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - If the fact that an article contains original research or that it was inadequately referenced were reason for deletion, a very large and significant fraction of the articles on Wikipedia would have to be deleted. This article needs to be fixed, not deleted. This article should focus on the famous Robert A. Heinlein quotation, which can be very heavily referenced. Most of the other material, while probably accurate, is superfluous and mostly based upon the opinions of anonymous editors. One can walk into any bookstore or library and find references for the Heinlein concept. It is based upon The Notebooks of Lazarus Long, which is both a separately published Heinlein work and a part of the famous Heinlein novel, Time Enough for Love. (Both works were published in both hardback and paperback editions, and both have been in print since the 1970s.) Lazarus Long is one of the most well-known characters in all of science fiction literature, and significant enough to warrant his own Wikipedia article. X5dna (talk) 07:40, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Most entries in the Stock characters template leaves a lot to be desired. Perhaps it is time we went trhoguh them one by one and did a massive cleanup with all this TVTropes-esque content.--Coin945 (talk) 08:53, 27 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment This article badly needs to be split into two different articles: "Competent man" and "Competent man in fiction and popular culture" (This has been successfully done elsewhere in Wikipedia where the original article began as an unreferenced mess.) The article conflates any real person with a broad and deep skill set with a fictional stock character. The Heinlein quotation refers to real competent humans, while the remainder of the article essentially falsely asserts that such people do not exist in reality and proceeds to list a large number of fictional and cartoon characters. X5dna (talk) 03:55, 28 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 02:22, 30 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - This is an essay without any references.--Rpclod (talk) 02:48, 30 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Leaving aside the issue of whether we should have an article on this topic, deletion is out of the question because this is an obvious redirect to Competence (WP:R). James500 (talk) 04:40, 31 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and improve. Satisfies GNG. Plenty of coverage in GBooks. James500 (talk) 05:00, 31 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Natg 19 (talk) 08:47, 7 September 2014 (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.