Talk:accelerating universe

Deletion discussion

The following information passed a request for deletion.

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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accelerating universe

—Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:18, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

• I lean towards keep. "accelerating" normally means "increasing in speed", not "increasing in rate of expansion". Smurrayinchester (talk) 05:06, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
• Sum of parts - crap definition - delete SemperBlotto (talk) 06:32, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
• Delete DCDuring TALK 07:54, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
• Delete per nom. bd2412 T 13:16, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
• Keep. Delete. I really hope that people who write definitions like that aren't involved in scientific research. Pfftallofthemaretaken (talk) 19:03, 28 September 2015 (UTC) OK, I'm convinced (see below). Pfftallofthemaretaken 17:46, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
• Keep. The universe is not accelerating, is it? It is the expansion that is accelerating. So per Smurrayinchester. Also, dictionary.reference.com has it[1]. As for the definition being crap or not, we now have "a universe whose expansion is accelerating", which looks fine. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:25, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Well, we cannot very well use 'whose' if it's not alive. And the phrase refers, very specifically, to our universe, so it cannot be 'a universe' . I would fix the definition, but the thing is, accelerating universe is a theory, and is only applicable within another, larger theory of the metric expansion of space, so you need to mention both, and at least some background information to make the definition more than a confusing jumble of science-speak. So, before long, we would have a small encyclopedia article—which we don't need, since we have a "bigger, better" article on Wikipedia.

In short, still delete. User:Pfftallofthemaretaken 11:24, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

The above user is Pfftallofthemaretaken, who has already voted above. I am removing the boldface from the above "delete" to remove confusion for the closing admin, and removing the obfuscation from the signature. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:56, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

• Keep per Smurrayinchester. The phrase "accelerating universe" would be expected to mean a universe that is moving through some external space at an accelerating rate. Instead, it means a universe that is expanding at an accelerating rate. This is idiomatic. In response to Pfftallofthemaretaken's objection to "whose", sense 3 of "whose" is appropriate for the definition. —Mr. Granger (talk • contribs) 12:50, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

These are some sad developments in the use of the English language that I was unaware of.

My objections to the use of ' a universe' and making Wiktionary a shorter, worse Wikipedia still stand. Pfftallofthemaretaken 13:08, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

The question is, is the term a semantic sum of parts (SOP) or not? This question is mandated by WT:CFI. There really is not a question of whether Wikipedia covers this: Wikipedia covers black hole as well, and we're not in the process of removing black hole, quantum mechanics, uncertainty principle, wave-particle duality, or de Broglie wavelength only because they are covered by Wikipedia. ---Dan Polansky (talk) 13:19, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

'Black hole' has gone way beyond science in its use, and that's why we have the entry. 'Quantum mechanics' is also quite mainstream. As for all the other things—maybe we should be discussing whether to remove them or not. I'm not going to start those discussions, but would certainly be in favor of removal.

Getting back to accelerating universe—this is what OneLook yields: [[2]]

The only 'dictionary' entry comes from Dictionary.com (which isn't a dictionary)—they borrowed it from The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, a rather obscure publication. Should we be following their example?

Compare with 'black hole': [[3]] Pfftallofthemaretaken 13:48, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

• Keep per Smurrayinchester. Not a sum of parts as the intended meaning is not immediately derivable from the term itself. It is not a theory either (that would be "the accelerating universe theory" for which there is no entry). I agree that "whose" is awkwardly expressed. If the def is poor - surely this means it needs improving not deleting. I don't see any problem with "a universe" since we do not really know if there are others, and the term accelerating universe could be use to discuss other theoretically posited universes that similarly expand (also our def 2 of universe covers this usage). That it is not in other dictionaries seems to be a poor standard to use in this case.Sonofcawdrey (talk) 04:15, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

"It is not a theory either (that would be "the accelerating universe theory" for which there is no entry)."—Do we refer to evolution as 'the evolution theory' every time we mention it? It is a theory. Scientists made observations and then tried to create a system that would explain said observations.

"I don't see any problem with "a universe" since we do not really know if there are others, and the term accelerating universe could be use to discuss other theoretically posited universes that similarly expand..."—Sure thing. If one day there is incontrovertible proof that other universes exist, and if the same observation regarding their expansion is made, then perhaps this term could be applied to those hypothetical universes. Until then, it's ' the universe'.

As for everything else—I'm convinced. Have just amended the definition and changed my vote to 'keep'.

(Although, now that I think of it, it's scary that people involved in scientific research cannot make themselves clear even in something as basic as the everyday terminology they use. Educational standards are indeed falling.) Pfftallofthemaretaken 17:46, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Is it really a theory or is it a universe that is accelerating (or expanding) which is itself described by a theory? The point about accelerate not normally meaning expanding (increasing in size) is a good one and I have no answer to it without doing a bit of research first.

• Keep, since it does not describe motion but rather rate of expansion. This is an important term to determine whether or not a big crunch or a big rip might occur. Nicole Sharp (talk) 06:08, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Kept. bd2412 T 14:07, 19 October 2015 (UTC)