The result was keep. ( non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman ( talk) 12:24, 15 May 2009 (UTC) reply
No way this can be expanded without violating NPOV. Also, there's no evidence "greatness" as such is a concept of particular significance to philosophy or history, aside from the idea of Carlyle's linked to here, nor does it necessarily make sense to assume that if historians refer to someone as "the Great" they are referencing a consistent, abstract idea of greatness--in fact Albertus Magnus would seem to have earned the moniker for very different qualities than the others mentioned in the article. Chick Bowen 18:07, 8 May 2009 (UTC) reply
And, yes, Hans J. Morgenthau and Jerry L. Walls ( a professor of the philosophy of religion with a degree in philosophy) have written about it, too.
Far from there being "no evidence 'greatness' as such is a concept of particular significance to philosophy or history", there's evidence in abundance if one actually goes looking, some of it dating back two and one half millennia. Did anyone look?
The problem with this article is solved by writing — and by writing not in the cargo cultist let's-collect-people-known-as-The-Great-and-hope-that-an-article-magically-arises manner, but by using the actual sources that discuss this topic. (It should be noted, in fairness, that the current article doesn't do too much of this. In fact, at the time of nomination it was a verifiable stub. It wasn't hard to find a source supporting the first part of the introduction, for example.) It is not solved by deletion.
Greatness is good enough for Voltaire et al.. And, with the multiplicity and depths of sources available, it's good enough for us. This is a verifiable stub, with clear scope for significant expansion. (I suggest reading Voltaire, for starters.) Per Wikipedia:Deletion policy, we keep those. Uncle G ( talk) 04:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC) reply
The result was keep. ( non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman ( talk) 12:24, 15 May 2009 (UTC) reply
No way this can be expanded without violating NPOV. Also, there's no evidence "greatness" as such is a concept of particular significance to philosophy or history, aside from the idea of Carlyle's linked to here, nor does it necessarily make sense to assume that if historians refer to someone as "the Great" they are referencing a consistent, abstract idea of greatness--in fact Albertus Magnus would seem to have earned the moniker for very different qualities than the others mentioned in the article. Chick Bowen 18:07, 8 May 2009 (UTC) reply
And, yes, Hans J. Morgenthau and Jerry L. Walls ( a professor of the philosophy of religion with a degree in philosophy) have written about it, too.
Far from there being "no evidence 'greatness' as such is a concept of particular significance to philosophy or history", there's evidence in abundance if one actually goes looking, some of it dating back two and one half millennia. Did anyone look?
The problem with this article is solved by writing — and by writing not in the cargo cultist let's-collect-people-known-as-The-Great-and-hope-that-an-article-magically-arises manner, but by using the actual sources that discuss this topic. (It should be noted, in fairness, that the current article doesn't do too much of this. In fact, at the time of nomination it was a verifiable stub. It wasn't hard to find a source supporting the first part of the introduction, for example.) It is not solved by deletion.
Greatness is good enough for Voltaire et al.. And, with the multiplicity and depths of sources available, it's good enough for us. This is a verifiable stub, with clear scope for significant expansion. (I suggest reading Voltaire, for starters.) Per Wikipedia:Deletion policy, we keep those. Uncle G ( talk) 04:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC) reply