Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Turfan volcano

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. However if someone believes they can further address and re-scope, happy to provide as a draft. Star Mississippi 00:56, 13 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Turfan volcano

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

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

The Global Volcanism Program does no longer have an entry for this volcano and the only other source (doi:10.1016/S1367-9120(02)00081-0) is extremely undetailed. I notice that this old source explicitly says that identifying a volcano there was an error. The existence of this volcano was already questioned on the talk page, the source proffered there is dead. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 13:51, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per nom, this shouldn't be here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:12, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of China-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 16:35, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Geography-related deletion discussions. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 20:29, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Clearly an error. –dlthewave ☎ 20:45, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Looking at satellite imagery for the coordinates given by the Global Volcanism Program source doesn't show anything to indicate there is any sort of "volcano" located at or near the given coordinates. Searching it up doesn't yield any useful results either other than briefly mentioning the supposed 1120 eruption. Unless there is solid proof to prove otherwise that there (pretty unlikely) was a volcano there at some point, then this article should be deleted. Streetlampguy301 (talk) 20:53, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom. Volcanoguy 00:29, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep There are historical reports of a volcano, and this area has a history of volcanic activity[1]. Even if modern geologists might disagree (a big if?) it's not like this is a hoax. I've added a cite to an 8th century poem by frontier poet Cen Shen. Oblivy (talk) 03:18, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
- That source talks about volcanic activity in the Permian more than 200 million years ago, a completely different topic than historical volcanic activity. We can't interpret that poem or undetailed historical sources as referring to volcanic activity; the Turpan-Hami basin knows coal seam fires (e.g this source) so unless a source distinguishes between the two scenarios, we can't know that the poem refers to volcanic eruptions. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:58, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  - I understand the source is not one showing active volcanic activity, although I am led to believe[2] that there is an active fault line in that area. But the fact that you may doubt whether the historic record is accurate doesn't negate that there are historic sources which refer to volcanoes (the poem refers to a volcano near Jiaohe, not necessarily an eruption). You aren't going to be able to go back and interrogate historical sources from 1000 years ago - we have what we have.
    The article on Dauvergne, cited in the nomination, is a commentary on another traveler's report which notes reports of volcanoes in the area, although it focuses on European claims rather than Chinese ones.
    May I suggest that the way to resolve this is not to delete the article, but to contextualize the claim that there was once an active volcano in the area? Oblivy (talk) 09:31, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    - I figure that there is active faulting there, but a fault is still a completely different thing than a volcano. The problem with contextualizing is that that poem is quite undetailed and a primary source, anyway. Kind of hard to call that WP:SIGCOV. I also wonder if the translation of the poem, Chinese word to the English word "volcano", is accurate. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 10:00, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
      - Dauvergne article is relatively significant coverage since it identifies the reports of volcanoes and then attempts to debunk. There's also evidence of an earlier claim (unfortunately can't access the article now, but it's what's being debunked).
        火山 is volcano. The poem title includes 郡在火山脚, "county at the foot of the volcano", and it includes the verse 火山赤崔巍 which is something like "red, towering volcano". Oblivy (talk) 11:01, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
        
        Sure? Because to me and also to Dr. Regel that looks like a reference to Flaming Mountains, which aren't volcanic. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 11:15, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
        Yes? 火山 means volcano (see [3] "Volcanoes are geological structures with special shapes formed when high-temperature magma and related gases and debris erupt from the planet's crust in the magma chamber under the earth's surface.")
        I suppose it's possible that there was some lexical drift from Tang Dynasty Chinese, but more likely the Regel interpretation is an orientalist gloss (split the characters, 海豚 becomes "sea pig" instead of "dolphin"). Somewhere I have a 19th century Chinese-English dictionary, but I'd have to search for it. Oblivy (talk) 11:48, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
        
        Comment I have expanded the article based on the above discussion, to include Humboldt's work and the controversies over the existence of the volcano. Oblivy (talk) 02:32, 15 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
        Not very strong ones, though - Earth's landscape : an encyclopedia of the world's geographic features has no page number given and gbtimes article that gives no indication of its own source and is from a non-specialist. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 10:48, 15 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
        Fair enough, I just wanted to show the article could be made into something that discusses the discussion of its existence, rather than the more controversial question of whether historical accounts were correct. The GB times one isn't mine. Oblivy (talk) 13:08, 15 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I have edited the article to describe the controversy over the existence of the volcano. As it stands now, it no longer a claim that a volcano actually exists, but a documentation of earlier claims and later rebuttals to those claims. The original rationale no longer applies, and the prior votes are based on a version of the article that no longer exists. Thanks to @Jo-Jo Eumerus for their valuable input.
Either this article should survive deletion on grounds of WP:HEY or it should be relisted to generate further discussion. Oblivy (talk) 02:16, 18 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
- Hrm. Here I worry about the fact that we are talking about a volcano close to Jiaohe ruins (SW from Turfan) and also about the Flaming Mountains (NE of Turfan). Are we sure the sources are talking about the same area? It's these kinds of little incongruencies that are a problem in articles with only-barely WP:SIGCOV sourcing. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:15, 18 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  - If you look at a map, Jiaohe is about 10km down the road from modern-day Turpan. Both sit along the base of the Tian Shan. The "Flaming Mountain" moniker is applied to a long strip of the Tianshan, probably more than 100km wide (and the person who suggested the conflation of the two was writing about 10,000km away in London). Oblivy (talk) 23:38, 18 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    - Actually, the person writing about the red rocks in Turfan was Johann Albert von Regel who lived in China and travelled the place and didn't even write in English let alone live in London. Uncle G (talk) 15:51, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Relisting to determine if the updated article scope is enough to negate the deletion arguments.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 02:27, 22 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Ditto for last relisting. It would be helpful if editors who voted "Delete" reviewed the current state of the article.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 02:59, 29 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

As implied above, I still favour deletion. These little contradictions make me question whether the sources are talking about one topic. I don't know of any place where the Permian is considered "prehistoric"; usually in both science and colloquial "prehistoric" means when humans were around but didn't write down anything yet. Still think WP:SIGCOV is not met, with passing mentions and a primary source (the poem). Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:30, 29 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Final relist; independent assessment of the recent changes made would be helpful.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Vanamonde93 (talk) 06:41, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

So we have some old pems; Alexander von Humboldt saying there was a volcano in 1849; an 1881 source saying that Humboldt was wrong, and misled by the old poems, based upon the reports of Johann Albert von Regel who lived in China; and 21st century geologists also deciding that this is an error. And on that we are basing an article about a Turfan volcano. Why are we propagating this error 170 years later, and going back to the poems that have been contradicted for 140 years? Uncle G (talk) 15:51, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid that delete remains clearly the right outcome here. Trojan efforts have been made to save it, but they are misguided, and we don't want a geography article about a non-existent structure. The fact that early writers made mistakes about it isn't sufficient justification. Nor is this a notable hoax, which might have formed a rationale for keeping it. It's time to delete this now, the topic has been well explored. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:56, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: This fails per the nom. UtherSRG (talk) 16:17, 8 January 2024 (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.