The result was no consensus. As is common with mass nominations, it would be better to nominate them individually and thus I am closing no consensus with no prejudice to immediate re-nomination here Black Kite (talk) 10:33, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Subjects (Anderson and the bundled biographies of LDS Church leaders below) are not notable in the WP:GNG sense; I did not find significant independent coverage of the subjects in reliable sources. Significant coverage occurs in publications owned or supported by the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Church News, Deseret News, Ensign, Liahona, Lds.org, etc.), but because of the subjects' positions within the church, the sources are not independent of the subjects.
MULTIPLE NOMINATIONS: I am also nominating the following related pages for the same reasons:
All the subjects are included in the list section List of general authorities of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints#Second Quorum of the Seventy. Please indicate whether your opinion is to Keep all, Delete all, or Redirect all, or if there you feel differently about certain articles, clarify which your votes refer too (e.g., Delete all except Koichi Aoyagi).
Redirection to the "Second Quorum" list section above is an option instead of deletion. I favor deletion as I don't see the benefit to redirection in this case; searching for a name on Google or typing it in Wikipedia will still get you to the list page.
For other AfD discussions of biographies from the same "Second Quorum" list section, see:
–– Agyle ( talk) 21:07, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
Keven At Wikipedia, the threshold for inclusion is verifiability with wp:prominence, not wp:notability. Unscintillating ( talk) 03:56, 10 July 2014 (UTC)
Comment - As I initially started writing this I was leaning toward delete, but as I started hashing out the arguments, I now lean toward keep. I am not an expert on all the nuances of Wikipedia notability criteria, but it seems to me that generally speaking we need significant coverage in reliable, independent sources. The LDS sources are sufficiently reliable. There is a question as to their independence, but I'm willing to ignore that for now (for reasons that will be shown below). My biggest problem is that the coverage doesn't seem significant. The articles for most of these guys are sourced from a single article, which is usually the equivalent of the church's press release stating that the person has been put in the new position, with minimal biographic data to add some flavor. With a little digging some individuals appear significant for other reasons (for example, Kevin S. Hamilton - a similar individual who was recently deleted for the same above reasons might have been kept for his involvement in the CA Prop 8 debate, but I'm late coming to these discussions, and that apparently wasn't considered at the time he was deleted), but the sources used in these articles don't seem to constitute significant coverage.
However, there are exceptions where the coverage is not required. (Coverage creates a presumption of notability, but it is not necessarily sufficient or required.) There is a per se rule with regards to politicians who may or may not have significant news coverage, and the criteria for academics might also apply. Academics can be notable if they are recognized authorities in their fields (being a member of a prestigious board is sufficient to meet this criteria) and their fields are notable, even if there is not significant coverage from independent media sources (verifiability becomes the issue here, so while independent sources are not required to prove notability, they may be needed to verify claims if the only information available on an academic is on that academic's website. The LDS sources do appear sufficiently reliable to verify the information claimed, even if not sufficiently independent to provide notability). Religious officers are a weird blend of politician and academic in that they can have a significant impact on people through their quasi-executive, judicial, and legislative powers, they are clearly authorities in their fields, and most of this comes by virtue of their office and not necessarily from what they did before they got there. I think we should adopt similar guidelines with respect to the Latter-day Saints as exists for the Catholic hierarchy. General guidelines for the notability of LDS hierarchy would answer the question for all of the above candidates for deletion and the previously deleted candidates.
Members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve would probably meet the notability criteria by virtue or their office similar to politicians. These individuals almost all have extensive news coverage from LDS and non-LDS sources, but even in the absence of significant coverage, the impact of these individuals on the membership of the LDS church is significant enough to make them notable. Church members will reference statements of these top authorities in a manner similar to the way American attorneys will cite Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. These individuals speak at least twice a year to the entire church and make visits to various congregations around the world on an ongoing basis. If for no other reason than their significance within their own church, these individuals should probably be treated like academics or politicians, and the issue with these individuals shouldn't be notability, but verifiability. I would also suggest the same for members of the Presiding Bishopric, the Presidency of the Seventy, and possibly the Auxiliary Presidencies. Stake pesidents and bishops are clearly too low on the totem pole to be considered notable by virtue of their office. Though not decisive, they also serve as lay leaders on a part-time basis. Mission presidents are full-time, generally held in slightly higher prestige, but essentially at a similar rank to a stake prsident as far as actual authority goes. (I suppose a mission president may be slightly more likely to be considered notable for their work if they are the first person to bring the church into a new country.) The real debate here surrounds the question of whether Seventies should be notable by virtue of their office and nothing more.
Members of the Third through Eigth Quorums of the Seventy (or however many quorums there are now) theoretically have the potential to play a policy making role for the entire church (the church is governed by the combined consensus of all of the Quorums of the Seveny in the absense of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Tweleve), but this power does not appear to have ever taken effect, and members of these quorums are only considered "local authorities" who serve on a part-time and temporary basis. Their names are not generally known in the church, even in the local areas where they are considered authorities, their sermons are rarely recorded or repeated, and their directions and policies are rarely implemented outside of the individual congregations where they fulfilled a specific assignment, such as reorganizing a stake. The exception would be those members who also serve in an Area Presidency as part of their call.
On the other hand, members of the First and Second Quorums are considered "general authorities", meaning they can go to any congregation in the world and they automatically have the right to take control of the meeting, remove and replace local leaders, and even give policy directives that would remain in effect until revoked by another general authority in equal or higher rank. Rarely does this happen unless the Seventy is on a special assignment, but that is the nature of the office. They are also asked to speak in General Conference, but unlike the Apostles who are generally invited to speak at least once every six months, most seventies probably will only speak once every 5-10 years. When they do speak their words are treated as authoritative, and their sermons will be studied and are often made the topic of discussions in congregations around the world, but the sermons are usually not as closely studied as are the words of the Apostles, and the lower frequency of the sermons means there are fewer available to study. The only real difference between the First and Second Quorum is duration. The Second quorum serves for five years, the First Quorum serves until given emeritus status at age seventy. The other distinction is that notable members of the Second Quorum are typically called to serve in the First Quorum after being released, so the First Quorum is probably more "notable" from a Wikipedia perspective as well.
As a quasi-legislative body of significant weight in the LDS church whose individual members are held in such high regard that their every word is studied and analyzed, I think seventies can be considered per se notable. Would this apply to all quorums, just the First and Second, just the First, or just those who have actually spoken in General Conference (making them and their words the targets of a much higher level of scrutiny and probably public figures on the specific issue in most common law jurisdictions)? What about those seventies who served in Area Presidencies (where they played an active policy making role rather than waiting for an assignment)? In other cases (such as a Catholic Bishop) the concensus apperars to be that they are always found notable, even in the absence of sources. (See Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)#Religious_leaders). This is partly because the assumption is that sources exist, but may not always be readily accessible, but the fact is the office itself seems to be the deciding factor, not an assumption about sources. But even the source issue could easily apply to these officials. The LDS church keeps an extensive archive, and if one wanted one could certainly research the primary sources to analyze the specific activities of these individuals while serving in the office. Primary sources wouldn't provide a basis for notability (secondary sources are the rule), but if we accept notability based on the office then the primary sources could be the basis of beefing up the articles on these individuals.
Again, to summarize, because of the breadth of the actual authority of these individuals, and the way that their words are studied and cited as authoritative when they do speak to a larger audience (especially the General Conferences sermons of the First and Second Quorum members), I think there is a good argument to be made for keeping articles about the whole group being discussed herein. Vojen ( talk) 20:56, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
The result was no consensus. As is common with mass nominations, it would be better to nominate them individually and thus I am closing no consensus with no prejudice to immediate re-nomination here Black Kite (talk) 10:33, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Subjects (Anderson and the bundled biographies of LDS Church leaders below) are not notable in the WP:GNG sense; I did not find significant independent coverage of the subjects in reliable sources. Significant coverage occurs in publications owned or supported by the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Church News, Deseret News, Ensign, Liahona, Lds.org, etc.), but because of the subjects' positions within the church, the sources are not independent of the subjects.
MULTIPLE NOMINATIONS: I am also nominating the following related pages for the same reasons:
All the subjects are included in the list section List of general authorities of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints#Second Quorum of the Seventy. Please indicate whether your opinion is to Keep all, Delete all, or Redirect all, or if there you feel differently about certain articles, clarify which your votes refer too (e.g., Delete all except Koichi Aoyagi).
Redirection to the "Second Quorum" list section above is an option instead of deletion. I favor deletion as I don't see the benefit to redirection in this case; searching for a name on Google or typing it in Wikipedia will still get you to the list page.
For other AfD discussions of biographies from the same "Second Quorum" list section, see:
–– Agyle ( talk) 21:07, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
Keven At Wikipedia, the threshold for inclusion is verifiability with wp:prominence, not wp:notability. Unscintillating ( talk) 03:56, 10 July 2014 (UTC)
Comment - As I initially started writing this I was leaning toward delete, but as I started hashing out the arguments, I now lean toward keep. I am not an expert on all the nuances of Wikipedia notability criteria, but it seems to me that generally speaking we need significant coverage in reliable, independent sources. The LDS sources are sufficiently reliable. There is a question as to their independence, but I'm willing to ignore that for now (for reasons that will be shown below). My biggest problem is that the coverage doesn't seem significant. The articles for most of these guys are sourced from a single article, which is usually the equivalent of the church's press release stating that the person has been put in the new position, with minimal biographic data to add some flavor. With a little digging some individuals appear significant for other reasons (for example, Kevin S. Hamilton - a similar individual who was recently deleted for the same above reasons might have been kept for his involvement in the CA Prop 8 debate, but I'm late coming to these discussions, and that apparently wasn't considered at the time he was deleted), but the sources used in these articles don't seem to constitute significant coverage.
However, there are exceptions where the coverage is not required. (Coverage creates a presumption of notability, but it is not necessarily sufficient or required.) There is a per se rule with regards to politicians who may or may not have significant news coverage, and the criteria for academics might also apply. Academics can be notable if they are recognized authorities in their fields (being a member of a prestigious board is sufficient to meet this criteria) and their fields are notable, even if there is not significant coverage from independent media sources (verifiability becomes the issue here, so while independent sources are not required to prove notability, they may be needed to verify claims if the only information available on an academic is on that academic's website. The LDS sources do appear sufficiently reliable to verify the information claimed, even if not sufficiently independent to provide notability). Religious officers are a weird blend of politician and academic in that they can have a significant impact on people through their quasi-executive, judicial, and legislative powers, they are clearly authorities in their fields, and most of this comes by virtue of their office and not necessarily from what they did before they got there. I think we should adopt similar guidelines with respect to the Latter-day Saints as exists for the Catholic hierarchy. General guidelines for the notability of LDS hierarchy would answer the question for all of the above candidates for deletion and the previously deleted candidates.
Members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve would probably meet the notability criteria by virtue or their office similar to politicians. These individuals almost all have extensive news coverage from LDS and non-LDS sources, but even in the absence of significant coverage, the impact of these individuals on the membership of the LDS church is significant enough to make them notable. Church members will reference statements of these top authorities in a manner similar to the way American attorneys will cite Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. These individuals speak at least twice a year to the entire church and make visits to various congregations around the world on an ongoing basis. If for no other reason than their significance within their own church, these individuals should probably be treated like academics or politicians, and the issue with these individuals shouldn't be notability, but verifiability. I would also suggest the same for members of the Presiding Bishopric, the Presidency of the Seventy, and possibly the Auxiliary Presidencies. Stake pesidents and bishops are clearly too low on the totem pole to be considered notable by virtue of their office. Though not decisive, they also serve as lay leaders on a part-time basis. Mission presidents are full-time, generally held in slightly higher prestige, but essentially at a similar rank to a stake prsident as far as actual authority goes. (I suppose a mission president may be slightly more likely to be considered notable for their work if they are the first person to bring the church into a new country.) The real debate here surrounds the question of whether Seventies should be notable by virtue of their office and nothing more.
Members of the Third through Eigth Quorums of the Seventy (or however many quorums there are now) theoretically have the potential to play a policy making role for the entire church (the church is governed by the combined consensus of all of the Quorums of the Seveny in the absense of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Tweleve), but this power does not appear to have ever taken effect, and members of these quorums are only considered "local authorities" who serve on a part-time and temporary basis. Their names are not generally known in the church, even in the local areas where they are considered authorities, their sermons are rarely recorded or repeated, and their directions and policies are rarely implemented outside of the individual congregations where they fulfilled a specific assignment, such as reorganizing a stake. The exception would be those members who also serve in an Area Presidency as part of their call.
On the other hand, members of the First and Second Quorums are considered "general authorities", meaning they can go to any congregation in the world and they automatically have the right to take control of the meeting, remove and replace local leaders, and even give policy directives that would remain in effect until revoked by another general authority in equal or higher rank. Rarely does this happen unless the Seventy is on a special assignment, but that is the nature of the office. They are also asked to speak in General Conference, but unlike the Apostles who are generally invited to speak at least once every six months, most seventies probably will only speak once every 5-10 years. When they do speak their words are treated as authoritative, and their sermons will be studied and are often made the topic of discussions in congregations around the world, but the sermons are usually not as closely studied as are the words of the Apostles, and the lower frequency of the sermons means there are fewer available to study. The only real difference between the First and Second Quorum is duration. The Second quorum serves for five years, the First Quorum serves until given emeritus status at age seventy. The other distinction is that notable members of the Second Quorum are typically called to serve in the First Quorum after being released, so the First Quorum is probably more "notable" from a Wikipedia perspective as well.
As a quasi-legislative body of significant weight in the LDS church whose individual members are held in such high regard that their every word is studied and analyzed, I think seventies can be considered per se notable. Would this apply to all quorums, just the First and Second, just the First, or just those who have actually spoken in General Conference (making them and their words the targets of a much higher level of scrutiny and probably public figures on the specific issue in most common law jurisdictions)? What about those seventies who served in Area Presidencies (where they played an active policy making role rather than waiting for an assignment)? In other cases (such as a Catholic Bishop) the concensus apperars to be that they are always found notable, even in the absence of sources. (See Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)#Religious_leaders). This is partly because the assumption is that sources exist, but may not always be readily accessible, but the fact is the office itself seems to be the deciding factor, not an assumption about sources. But even the source issue could easily apply to these officials. The LDS church keeps an extensive archive, and if one wanted one could certainly research the primary sources to analyze the specific activities of these individuals while serving in the office. Primary sources wouldn't provide a basis for notability (secondary sources are the rule), but if we accept notability based on the office then the primary sources could be the basis of beefing up the articles on these individuals.
Again, to summarize, because of the breadth of the actual authority of these individuals, and the way that their words are studied and cited as authoritative when they do speak to a larger audience (especially the General Conferences sermons of the First and Second Quorum members), I think there is a good argument to be made for keeping articles about the whole group being discussed herein. Vojen ( talk) 20:56, 14 July 2014 (UTC)