Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/MacFarlane's bear (2nd nomination)

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 redirect to Grizzly bear. If an entity is considered by science to be a cryptid, we need sources discussing it as a cryptid; otherwise we risk spreading pseudoscience. As such I'm inclined to give very early sources much less weight, and consensus is against a standalone article even otherwise. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:02, 26 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

MacFarlane's bear (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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

Most of this page is entirely unsourced, with the only source being a general study into the variations of North American bears, and this is not explicitly connected to the subject matter of MacFarlane's bear. Delete entirely, though a redirect could be maintained to List of individual bears if necessary. TNstingray (talk) 12:44, 19 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Non-notable, no sources found in GScholar or Jstor. Oaktree b (talk) 12:50, 19 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Animal and Canada. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 13:03, 19 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Redirect to Grizzly bear. This is a single source description of a subspecies that was invalidated later (good luck digging up an online copy of the 100 year-old original:Merriam, Clinton H. 1918. Review of the grizzly and big brown bears of North America (genus Ursus). North American Fauna 41: 1-136). This happens all the time, and if we dignified each instance with an article then we would have 86 articles for the brown bear alone. For that species, the post-genetics winnowing down to the current state is succinctly stated in one paragraph at Grizzly_bear#Ursus_arctos. That's all the coverage it should merit. If people think that "Monster Quest" (by golly) and this demand extra mention, then by all means add one sentence there. But definitely no separate article required. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 14:36, 19 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Elmidae: Original description of Vetulartctos at BHL. I've been operating under the assumption that BHL probably doesn't have original descriptions for most species, and thus I don't usually bother to search there. I'm rethinking that. 3 times now in the past 2 days I've searched BHL for an original description they've had it every time. If the original description is old enough to be out of copyright, it's worth checking BHL. Plantdrew (talk) 21:46, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's a nice resource - wasn't aware of it! Thanks. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 06:26, 22 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Redirect to Grizzly bear - Per Elmidae's comments. Pahiy (talk) 23:00, 19 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Seems to be covered in a number of books, for example https://archive.org/details/cryptozoologytoz00lore/page/146/mode/1up, https://archive.org/details/B-001-001-787/page/n261/mode/1up and https://archive.org/details/livesofgameanima0002seto/page/113/mode/1up Piecesofuk (talk) 15:39, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is that enough to warrant its own article though? TNstingray (talk) 16:42, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I don't know, there are more books out there. It was also featured in the Guinness Book of World Records as "Rarest Bear" Piecesofuk (talk) 17:05, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Of course I will defer to consensus, but is it more encyclopedically valuable to have this one-off stub, or include this information somewhere else (as seems to be the general trend)? Note: Guinness falls under WP:MREL, meaning it could go either way. TNstingray (talk) 20:11, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment: Entries in Mysterious Creatures: A Guide to Cryptozoology (ABC-CLIO and Cryptozoology A To Z (Simon & Schuster). Old, but still contributing to GNG coverage is found in Lives of Game Animals (by Ernest Thompson Seton, 1926), and Review of the Grizzly and Big Brown Bears of North America (by Clinton Hart Merriam, 1918). I'd normally think that adds up to GNG, but I'm not quite ready to !vote. The complete lack of coverage between the early 20th and early 21st centuries is confusing to me. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 21:29, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• There is also this 2011 news article. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 21:32, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Merriam 1918 is the original description, so that's kind of out of the running. Of course, if you want to go farther back, there is also the travel report that prompted Merriam to make the description (Maire and MacFarlane 1908, "Through the Mackenzie Basin"), but I would consider that the same instance. In essence it's about whether the various minor 21st century crytozoology churns add up to notability, on which opinion may differ. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 13:35, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a reason why Seton 1926 is completely out of the running? And surely if we were to redirect to Grizzly bear, a mention would need to be added there? Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 13:45, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Can't read that one apart from the TOC entry, I'm afraid...? --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 16:01, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, I hadn't read this far down before I posted the link to Merriam via BHL above. The link to Merriam via Google Books goes to a page for Ursus macfarlani, not the page for Vetularctos. Merriam gives U. macfarlani the vernacular name "MacFarlane Bear", which I'd say is ambiguous wiht "MacFarlane's bear". Where did the title for this undersourced article come from? Plantdrew (talk) 21:56, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment the initial version of the article is a COPYVIO of Cryptozoology A-Z. Multiple sentences are copied in full, with one unnecessary word added to Wikipedia's version. (note: Eddie891 also provided a link to this book above; Eddie891's link shows page 147 but not 146, my link shows 146 but not 147). Plantdrew (talk) 01:18, 22 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete primarily for long standing (16 year) copyright violations. This is a essentially a non-entity taxonomically (but the scientific name redirects Ursus inopinatus and Vetularctos inopinatus can be retargetted to grizzly bear and tagged with {{R from alternative scientific name}}). If there's any notability, it is due to recent interest from the cryptozoology commmunity; I'm not sure exactly what the notability standards are for cryptids, but I do know that most cryptids nominated at AfD don't survive it.

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.