Talk:Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Original Research in this article

In my copy of the book I find SFA of those squigly formula thingies. Though I understand it I call it WP:OR. That aside at least we're all against that NOMA stuff, as is Dawkins, and think it all quite possible to calculate the probability of god. Looks like the new gap for god is between the asymptote close to zero but someones parked a bunch of parts for a 747 in the way though. Ttiotsw 23:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

POV article

The criticisms of the view are 4 times the lenght of the explanations. Looks like a classic hatchet job. Sophia 10:09, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

It's not an encyclopedia article. It's a POV blog. It was an AfD candidate in November, and was deleted (redirected to The God Delusion). There is still no case for reviving the article. It offends against WP:NPOV, WP:OR. I am reverting. Gnusmas 19:49, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Come on guys, this is properly refed. There is no OR here and we only report what notable commentators say - taking no position on whether they are right or wrong, so it is NPOV. If you want an AfD debate have one by all means but I'm sure the consensus will be Keep. Dawkins considers this is the biggest single argument against the existence of God. Why don't you want an article about it - there are pages on pretty much every other one? I know it's a really bad argument, which has been heavily criticised by every philosophically qualified commentator who has commentated on it a far as I can see, but that's not my problem. By all means find some notable commentators who support it. But please don't try to hide an "inconvenient truth". NBeale 15:40, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Oh yes, beautifully referenced - Oh my goodness me, look at all those lovely footnotes - but not worth an article. It's just a phrase used by Dawkins in a book. We do not have an article on every nonce-phrase and neologism coined by writers. See WP:NOT. Snalwibma 17:41, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Snalwibma. The last time the article was completely different and it was a close run thing. The main complaints (OR, not enough refs, no notable commentators) have now been fully addressed. But please don't delete it by stealth. And it's not a throwaway phrase, Dawkins considers it the most important argument ("the big one") against the existence of God in his entire book. NBeale 17:48, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

  • No stealth involved. I am sticking to the principles discussed and upheld in the AfD debate. The article is about a topic that is too small to merit inclusion. It is a single phrase used by Dawkins. It is not a topic for an encyclopedia. I assume you want to see it included in its own right because you see it as an opportunity to push your point of view and indulge in some more Dawkins-bashing. This is not a justification for including something in an encyclopaedia. And if you do think it's worth having, could you at least please write it in English. Have you actually read the paragraph under the "Background" heading? What does it mean? If you can rewrite it in English, then maybe there is something we can discuss. As it stands, it's just garbage. Snalwibma 18:03, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Snalwibma. I agree that this bit, which I inherited, didn't make much sense so I have made it make sense and refed it, as requested. Of course it'd be great if you could improve the article, but having (sigh) re-read Dawkins's chapter it really isn't just a phrase, and it has had a lot of disussion. So could we move on and not redirect please. NBeale 19:20, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Hello NBeale! I have mixed feelings about this article. My personal opinion is that the argument has not been properly spelled out by Mr Dawkins. :) Still, there is an interesting debate going between Dennett and Orr. The fact that Dennett still considers this a significant contribution of the book is a good reason for having an article, but I'm afraid it is very hard to treat the subject properly based on the currently available sources. Most crucially, I don't know how to write a philosophical exposition of the argument, and even if I knew, it would be original research. --Merzul 00:40, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Interesting "Philosophical statement of the argument" added by NBeale. Note that this is NBeale's analysis, not Dawkins', and therefore original research. I can see no way that this article can be rescued from falling foul of WP:POV and WP:OR. There simply isn't enough out there to report on in an unbiased way. The whole basis of the article, anyway (like many others worked on by this editor - see, for example, Argument from love), is a bloggish POV-pushing attempt to persuade. It is being used as a hook to hang some more Dawkins-bashing on. It is not encyclopaedia material. It belongs in a blog, or in NBeale's next best-selling book, where he is entitled to push his own view of the world. It does not belong on Wikipedia. Snalwibma 08:38, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
    Although the outline can be roughly attributed to Plantinga, it's not very charitable to present an argument through the eyes of its critic. I don't think that Plantinga has done a bad job, in fact, I personally think his analysis is quite accurate, but I suspect Dawkins or Dennett might formalize the argument differently. In short, the NPOV problems raised here are serious. --Merzul 18:01, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
This article should be a redirect. As great as I think the book is, each argument within it does not deserve its own article. Sophia 18:06, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Not notable enough for an article of its own. If the Boeing 747 gambit deserves an article, then so does Fossil rabbits in the pre-Cambrian, and every other catchy phrase used by scientists and philosophers and other writers the world over. My view on this has nothing to do with whether I agree with the view that Nbeale is trying to push through this and other articles - though that is another issue! Gnusmas 19:56, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes, atheist Wikipedians would have a too easy time here if it wasn't for NBeale :) But the consensus seems against this argument's notability. Other than NBeale, I'm the only one that would be interested in this article, and I've raised my objections above, so do we go through another AfD to have some more opinions? --Merzul 21:36, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
What a waste of everyones time - quite frankly this is gaming the system at its best. No one agrees with NBeale and this article was deleted just 4 months ago. Do we need to go through this every few months until we get bored and give in? He has been reverted by numerous editors and is the only one pushing for a separate article so why is it still here? AfD here we go..... Sophia 21:48, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Just because something is created with an agenda doesn't mean the content is necessarily bad. This article is very different from the one that was nominated for deletion, and I'm genuinely interested in this argument, I'm especially curious in what Dennett sees in it. Having said that, I would currently vote redirect to The God Delusion, because we don't have enough sympathetic sources to write anything but a "Criticism of the Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit" and Plantinga and Orr are already included in the God Delusion article. However, if we would have a formal exposition of this argument by Dennett I would be interested in having an article here. --Merzul 21:58, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

AfD Proposal

As a relative newcomer to WikiPedia it still seems to me that if people want to nominate this as an AfD they should do so rather than stealth-delete through a redirect. If no-one else does a proper AfD nom then I suppose I will have to, but that seems odd since I don't think the article should be deleted. According to the journal of Evolutionary Philosophy: "Much of what Dawkins had to say in the first three chapters, especially his argument against agnosticism, depended entirely on his promise to prove in chapter four that God was too improbable to exist. Dawkins based the entire credibility of his book on this chapter, and the only proof that he delivered was a rhetorical hypothesis." So it's quite notable enough for its own article, and it is properly refed. Please either improve it or make a rational AfD case or leave it alone. NBeale 22:13, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Yes, the book is notable enough for its own article, and it has one. The phrase is not, and the only reason it has an article is because you (NBeale) see it as another glorious opportunity to stick a knife into Dawkins and indulge in your philosophical original research and bloggery. No need for another AfD. It was already discussed a couple of months ago. Let's stop wasting time and simply stick with the decision that was taken then. Make it a redirect to The God Delusion. Snalwibma 22:56, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
I would count this as a stealth recreate rather than a stealth delete as current concensus is way against recreating this article. Anyway I have just spent the last 30 mins working out how the afd pages work for a second nomination and we are up and running at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Ultimate_Boeing_747_gambit_2. Put the criticisms of the argument in the book where they can be kept within balance and without undue weight. Sophia 22:35, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Even so, thank you for going through the trouble and doing this in a formally correct way. I appreciate your efforts with the templates and all. This might not be a waste of time as the result might be an article on scientific arguments against the existence of God and there are very good sources and interesting books on that subject, so Dawkins' argument could be put in the appropriate context, and the criticism would no longer have undue weight because we could draw on far more sources on both sides of the argument. This would be a very good outcome, I mean, aren't these scientific arguments one of the main reasons people don't believe in God? --Merzul 23:32, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

The real argument here...

I have looked a bit for sources now, and one option would be to integrate the 747 gambit into the proper treatment of improbability arguments. In particular, look at the following books:

A sample chapter and summary of arguments:

For example, here is a much better formalization of Dawkins' argument. This is how he should have spelled it out (from Stenger's The Illusion of Design):

  1. Hypothesize a model God who is the creator and preserver of the physical universe, including Earth and the living organisms that abide on that planet.
  2. Assume that model God plays an important, continuing role in guiding the development of life on Earth.
  3. We can reasonably expect that empirical evidence should exist for design, purpose, and continuous outside action in the structures of those organisms.
  4. No such empirical evidence can be found.
  5. Science provides a purely material explanation for the development of those structures by mindless natural processes.
  6. Earth and life do not distinguish between the model God and a model in which there is no God. That is, they do look just as they can be expected to look if there is no God such as the model God.
  7. We conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that a God like our model God, who is the all-perfect, all-powerful, all-knowing creator and preserver of the physical universe including Earth and the living organisms that abide on that planet, does not exist.

This might not fit in this particular article (because of WP:SYNT concerns), but I have at least satisfied my own curiosity :) --Merzul 22:45, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Merzul. The problem is that this argument (Stenger's) is a completely different argument against the Existence of God from the one proposed by Dawkins at this point in the book. He approves of Stenger's arguments, but it's not the one he's making here. NBeale 03:09, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
This is right, but I was thinking of a broader article, in which Dawkins's argument can be seen as a variation. I'm not very fond of these very narrow articles that can not be expanded beyond what we currently have here. It also violates my principles to use a critic when outlining the logical form of an argument. --Merzul 08:41, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I would strongly support a more general article, with the Boeing 747 as one example among many (or maybe not so very many) arguments for the improbability (or against the probability) of a god. Alternatively, as I and others have been proposing all along, a more general article on The God Delusion, with the 747 featuring as one example of what Dawkins says in the book (which of course we already have). Either way, it's the same principle: the 747 on its own is not significant enough for a whole article, and the only way of producing any meaningful content about it seems to be to pick it to death and parade lots of critics all saying how woeful it is - which makes for a very one-sided POV article. One question about a more general god-improbability article: How many other such articles are there already, and how would this new one find its niche? Snalwibma 09:13, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm actually not quite sure what the general article would be and what would be its niche. What I do see are some good books on these issues, and I think atheist philosopher will increasingly turn their attention to this line of argument. Regarding other articles on Wikipedia, most of our arguments focus on the logical side showing the impossibility of God, e.g. argument from poor design. In any case, we seem to agree on the general point here that the current focus on Dawkins's popular title is too restrictive for an article on a stand-alone argument, but I notice that on the AfD there seems to be support for having this article as it currently stands, I'm a bit surprised, perhaps we should also have an article on the changing moral zeitgeist, which was praised by many reviewers, and could be seen as a standalone argument too by this measure. --Merzul 10:15, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

POV fork from The God Delusion

I have just deleted a reference in this 747 article to a review of TGD by Krauss (http://richarddawkins.net/article,238,n,n). The insertion of this, I submit, clearly demonstrates that this 747 article is no more than a POV fork from the article on the book. The referenced review does not even mention the 747. It's a review of the book. It's not about the 747. I maintain my position that this whole sorry article about the 747 is no more than an opportunity to parade yet more utterly predictable anti-Dawkins and pro-mumbo-jumbo comments from the religious right. Snalwibma 13:04, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Although the Nature and Science reviews don't use the words "747 Gambit" to describe this argument, they are both commenting on this particular argument that Dawkins makes at the points quoted - as is quite clear if you read the extracts or the reviews. One of Dawkins talents is to give catchy names to his ideas. We use this name in the article becasue it is what he says he calls it. NBeale 13:35, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Yes, of course I realise that these two reviews (Krauss and Shermer) mention the concepts behind the "747" metaphor. But the Krauss one in particular is a general review of TGD, and barely even mentions the idea, let alone the form of words that Dawkins uses. If the 747 article is to stand up on its own, you must restrict the sources to those that actually mention the phrase or something like it. In no way is Krauss commenting on "The Ultimate Boeing 747 Gambit". He is discussing the book in which those words crop up, and he does indeed mention very briefly the argument that lies behind the words, but he is silent on the "thing" itself as you are trying to establish it in this article. My contention would actually be that the "thing" does not exist. Or at least not yet. It may come to do so in time, as "The Origin of Species" or "The Selfish Gene" took time to establish their quasi-independent identities. When "The Ultimate Boeing 747 Gambit" takes on a life of its own in that way, sure, let's have an article on it. But in the meantime you are simply using it as a hook to hang your own musings on, and dragging in anyone who in your judgement can be assumed to be commenting on it (even if they don't mention it - but of course you know better than Krauss and Shermer themselves what they really mean!). I see this dragging-in of "commentators" who do not even comment on the topic of the article as very strong evidence that the article is a hook for pushing a POV, not a neutral article about a real topic. Snalwibma 13:50, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
  • As you admit, they comment on the concept/argument - not the words. You continually try to supress any information that goes against your POV, this must be the 10th time you have tried to wipe out things that you think are critical of Dawkins. Please trust readers and Editors to decide on the basis of well-refed information, and make constructive contribtions. NBeale 13:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
  • "The words" are the only justification for this article. Would you care to address the points I make, rather than just asking me to trust you? And would anyone else care to comment? I may sometimes stick my neck out a bit, but on this occasion I really do think I am right. I think there is an issue here of what exactly is the topic of the article. It's not just about the various ways in which Dawkins argues for the improbability of god; it is about a very specific formulation, using very specific words, and commentators on the book who do not mention anything like those words are not discussing the subject - and therefore do not belong here. Snalwibma 14:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
It's a specific formulation indeed, which I've tried to state philosophically. The basic problem is that Dawkins has no academic training in philosophy and has read almost no philosophers other than a few modern ones in his camp, so he is embarassingly bad at it (Michael Ruse says "The God Delusion makes me embarrassed to be an atheist") and much more comfortable with Sci-Fi. So the topic is Dawkins's "probabilistic argument against God" which attempts to redirect "the creationists' argument from complexity" - to which he gives the catchy name of the "Ultimate 747 Gambit". I agree that the name is a bit unfortunate - though not as silly as calling his book "The God Delusion" which no serious reviewer seems to approve of - but it is what Dawkins calls it so it seems not unreasonable to go with it. (BTW how come if I un-revert your reverts I get caught by 3RR and you don't?) NBeale 16:54, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Of course you are right Snalwibma - the whole point of this article is to indulge in an apologist favourite pastime - reduce a complex argument to something they think they can refute and then throw as much at it as they can. It's way easier to trash one out of context quote than to have to balance across a whole book.
I most worry about the comments by NBeale on the AfD about fairly representing all the published reports. Churches have lots of money and lots of time and they tend to write about things that annoy them alot. In this sense their views are way over represented in printed material and therefore real NPOV care is needed to balance the picture. Sophia 18:01, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Philosophical argument section

Unless the OR issues are addressed pretty soon this will need to be deleted as it is the ultimate in intellectual dishonesty to present an authors arguments through the words of their critics. Sophia 18:11, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Depends on who the critic is. When a someone like Dawkins summarises a Aquinas or Anselm then perhaps (so I hope you will revert The God Delusion). But Plantinga is a profesional philosopher and a tenured professor, and this is a fair minded summary - indeed it is a much better job than Dawkins ever does. All the Existence of God articles summarise the arguments and they are usually less refed than this one. I know you have tried to get some of them deleted, but you have rightly failed. You are losing the argument on the AfD and you should not be editing the article to make it worse while an AfD debate is going on. NBeale 22:38, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
If this is an article about a phrase that Dawkins coined then it should be presented in his words. The Existence of God arguments are generic and not attributed to any exclusive source so the fact that they are more general is fine. You have set the remit for this article - to focus on this Dawkins phrase exclusively - so you can't have it both ways. The philosophy of the argument must be presented as refs from the book otherwise it is not fairly representing what Dawkins intended. The fact that you see my attempts to salvage some credibility for this article as making it worse speaks volumes.
I'm also confused as to who you've got me mixed up with as I have never attempted to get any arguments deleted from Existence of God. In fact I have never edited the article to my knowledge and did not even know of its existence (no pun intended) until a couple of days ago. Sophia 22:54, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Sophia. I'm sorry it was Snalwibma who tried to get the Argument from love and Argument from beauty deleted, not you. Please forgive my confusion. However this article is about the argument that Dawkins initiated, not just about the phrases he used. You might as well require all discussion of the Ontological argument to stick to the words of Anselm. If you really think that taking out carefully refed material from Science and Nature makes the article better then I'm sorry - but as the principal author of the article it looks to me like making it less notable and less balanced, since the Science review is actually a (somewhat) positive comment. NBeale 00:07, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
NBeale - It is ridiculous to suggest that Plantinga knows what Dawkins meant better than Dawkins himself - but of course you put us all firmly in our places - Plantinga is a tenured philosopher and Dawkins only got a second-class degree ... What a lot of ludicrous high-handed arrogant biased snobbery. I have no doubt that there could be a worthwhile article based on Dawkins' phrase about the 747, but (IMHO) not until it has become established. I do not think that point has yet been reached, and that is why for the moment I think this article serves better as a redirect to The God Delusion. Dragging in "commentators" who do not comment on the article's topic, and using a critic to present Dawkins' argument instead of quoting his own words, smacks to me of a desperate attempt to dress up the article with as much pseudo-academic garbage as possible to make it look respectable. Emperor's new clothes. There is almost nothing at the core of this article. It is just a hook for some POV-pushing. That's why it should be a redirect. There - I think I've now said that often enough. Would you care to demonstrate how I am wrong? Snalwibma 23:18, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi S. Please leave the article in the best state I can get it and allow the independent editors (apart from me, Sophia and you) to judge. NBeale 00:07, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
"Please leave the article in the best state I can get it...."?????? Please read WP:OWN Sophia 00:10, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
Oooh ooh can I join your cabal ?. Is there some initiation ceremony ?. Does it hurt ?. Ttiotsw 08:39, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Not content with summarising Dawkins' argument in the words of one critic instead of letting Dawkins speak for himself, NBeale has now found two critics to speak on behalf of Dawkins! Platinga and Wielenberg must both know better than Dawkins himself what he means. Bow down before these great philosophers, all ye lesser mortals who have no formal philosophical training and are therefore unqualified to speak for yourselves! Ahem... If these two interpretations of Dawkins' argument belong in the article at all, they should be moved to the "Commentary" section. They are interpretations by others, not a fair and unbiased summary of the argument. Snalwibma 09:24, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

This is getting really silly now. If this article survives the AfD we definitely need an RfC to bring in outside editors. I know NBeale will take this as a hostile move but he needs to understand that he doesn't own the article and the way it is currently written could have WP:BLP problems as we are effectively putting words in Dawkins mouth. Sophia 10:06, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
I have removed that section as Dawkins didn't present the argument in this way. The '747 argument is a minor part of the book. This WP:OR simply bloats this article with someone's synthesis which is unattributable to Dawkins (who invented the '747 gambit neologism). Ttiotsw 12:04, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks - really didn't want to have to do it myself as my motives are suspected by some and I was worried my actions would not be judged on the quality of the edit. We really do have to be careful that we don't attribute to Dawkins things that he never actually said. Sophia 12:16, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
If this is indeed a philosophical argument against the existence of God with any validity at all (and Dawkins and Dennett seem to think it is) then, in accordance with the other philosophical arguments about the existence of God that have their own articles, it is right that there should be an attempt to state it in formal philosophical terms. Dawkins does not own this argument even if he introduced it (in his customarily hand-waving, non-rigorous way). I also don't think it right that editors who are trying to get the article deleted should then be trashing the article and removing key sections of it. NBeale 12:21, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
Please read this and this. Your attempts to make this discussion personal are unhelpful and beginning to get to the stage where outside moderation will needed. Sophia 12:27, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
As I have deleted this section here is why. It would be unwise to read too much into the detail of this stream of consciousness but simply take the first conclusion that you think of when you get to the end (I've been accused of being post-modernist so I've wikilinked it and I'm using Firefox on Ubuntu whilst debugging some 'C' code.)
The recourse to presenting this as a philosophical argument I think misses Dawkins' point. When the four colour problem was proposed was a solution presented as a philosophical argument on the existence of a 5-colour map ? No, mathematical proofs were attempted, though the best proofs to date rely on faith in the mechanism of the solution i.e. faith in the compiler. We do not even have to propose a ghost in the machine (in the sense that there is something in which we cannot see in operation) nor resort to metaphysics and need not step away from naturalism; we simply have to apply a probability to what knowledge we have as to its truth.
I feel that there is an article for using probability (e.g. Bayesian obviously topical with Richard Swinburne and Stephen Unwin) in the argument of providing a probability for any supernatural entity (The Abrahamic God being just the one example we are the most familiar from our various Western foundation myths) but the current article is simply criticism of one small section of one of Dawkins' books and does not expound on the probability argument. Orr, as an example, is a review that has had a bit of Quote mining done against Dawkins and does not do the desired subject justice (i.e. probability arguments regarding god). There is so much more that could be added if the scope was altered away from simply Dawkins and his '747 gambit which is the focus of this article. When people talk of complexity I personally presume computational complexity theory quite simply because today genetic algorithms are how we get practical solutions for some NP-complete problems. Alister McGrath must have missed this development on the way to writing his review. I'm not questioning the right to use the supernatural to provide a solution to these questions but in this article the arguments of the people who believe in various supernatural entities and the philosophers who give these thoughts an apparent substance have unbalanced the article. That is the essence of my objection to the philosophers. Ttiotsw 23:19, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Misuse of AfD page

NBeale - please carry out discussion of the article's content here, and do not misuse the AfD page to make unfounded allegations about the motives of your fellow-editors. Or, to put it another way, how exactly have I edited the article to make it worse? I have merely deleted references to two "commentators" who do not in fact comment on the topic of the article. You may disagree with me (I guess you do!) - but if so you should discuss it here. You have no right to make assumptions and allegations about my motives on another page. Snalwibma 23:31, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

"Commentators" who do and do not comment

I have edited the "commentators" section to try and clarify whether these people actually refer to the topic of the article. [Well, yes, of course I think those who don't should be deleted altogether.] It occurs to me, however, that I don't actually know whether McGrath, Orr, Dennett and Plantinga mention the 747 in any shape or form either. Would someone be able to check, and quote chapter and verse? If the article stays, let's at least make sure it contains only material that is germane to the subject! Snalwibma 07:46, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Recent edits

Dear NBeale - Please let me try and explain - first, what lies behind my own recent edits to the article, and second, why I think the article should be a redirect, not an article in its own right. You are of course correct in pointing out (above) that Dawkins does not own the argument in the wider sense that you are expanding it into in your edits, but he does (in a way) own the phrase that the article is about. You are quite entitled to write about the argument in the widest sense, but it is not appropriate to do so in this article. You have a choice: either (1) this is an article about the Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit or (2) it is an article about a wider kind of argument about complexity and designers and the probability or otherwise of a god, etc. If (1), then the contents must stick strictly to that subject, and not wander off into other variations on the theme, or bring in other commentaries on Dawkins' ideas which are not specifically about the "Boeing 747" idea. If (2), then the article should be called something different, such as Improbability of god or Argument from improbability. Seems to me that as long as it is called Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit there is in fact so little that really belongs there that it's better as a redirect to The God Delusion. That is why I have been consistently arguing for it be a redirect since last November. That's all. That's my agenda. No underhand tricks. No deliberate sabotage (far from it). No malice. Just sticking to some principles of what makes sense as an encyclopaedia article, and trying to uphold wikipedia principles like NPOV and OR. Snalwibma 16:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Snalwibma. The article is not about Dawkins's phrase but about the philosophical argument that he is trying to make. This philosophical argument is discussed by at least 8 notable commentators: (1) Richard Dawkins; (2)Alister McGrath (3)Alvin Plantinga (4)H. Allen Orr (5) Daniel Dennett, (6) William F. Vallicella (7) Michael Shermer in Science, (8) Lawrence M. Krauss in Nature. All but the last 2 use the phrase as well! You want the article deleted and have removed more than half the references to making it seem slighter. I'm glad that it is not deliberate sabotage, but even accidental sabotage should be avoided. NBeale 23:05, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Very brief reply. If the article is about the philosophical argument then it has the wrong title. Snalwibma 09:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Snalwibma. Dawkins explicitly gives this title to this argument: "It is a very strong and, I suspect unanswerable argument ... My name for the statistical demonstration that God almost certainly does not exist is the Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit"(The God Delusion, p113). I agree that Dawkins has an unfortunate knack of giving catchy but misleading titles to things. Even he admits that "The God Delusion" was a poor choice. NBeale 11:19, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Is this an effort to improve the article to merit retention?

An unusual number of individuals who feel that the content of this article should be deleted and turned into a redirect have jumped in and started making major edits to this article. For all those who fit this description, is this a good faith effort to improve the article so that it meets your personal standards for retention? If it is, why don't we try to find a consensus as to what should stay hear and what shouldn't in order to satisfy retention. If this is not an effort to improve the article that would lead to changed votes, it seem shard to understand the sudden burst of interest in editing this article. Alansohn 00:43, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi, Alansohn. Thanks for the question about "sudden interest" in the 747. In my case it is not in fact sudden at all, as I have taken the same position consistently since the first AfD debate last November. My position is as follows:

  1. The article is named for the "ultimate 747 gambit", and that is therefore the topic of the article. As such, there are a few brief mentions in Dawkins' book The God Delusion, plus a handful of comments from others in reviews etc.
  2. I believe that the phrase/metaphor/analogy/whatever-it-is has not yet achieved sufficient notability or life of its own (like, e.g. "survival of the fittest" or "the selfish gene"), and is best handled in passing in the article on the book. I am quite open to be proved wrong on this, and if the phrase itself (or the specific notion of the 747) is in fact notable enough, fine, let's have an article about it.
  3. But it is not acceptable, within this article, to use Dawkins' phrase as a jumping-off point for a lot of philosophising on the wider topic (improbability of god, or however it is best expressed) that the phrase leads people to think about. To do this is to move so far from the actual topic that the article is no longer about what it claims to be about.
  4. Furthermore, it is unacceptable to use the words of critics who seem to despise Dawkins' idea as a means of presenting what purports to be a summary of Dawkins' argument. That argument (such as it is, and it is indeed fairly meagre in philosophical terms) is best presented in Dawkins' own words. Then the article can move on to the responses of critics and others.
  5. But only those critics who actually comment on the idea of the 747 - not anyone who happens to have reviewed the book and has something to say about Dawkins' idea about the improbability of god, and not a lot of other people who say lots of interesting things about science and religion etc.
  6. One editor seems determined to push his own view, and not to engage in discussion on what is best for wikipedia in handling the 747 concept. As he is developing the article, it is moving further and further from (a) the actual 747 idea and (b) a fair and unbiased discussion of Dawkins' proposition. In fact (OK, this is my opinion, but it seems inescapable) the phrase is being used as a hook (a straw man?) on which to hang a lot of one-sided philosophy.
  7. The addition of all this material is being used as a means of dressing up the article amd padding it out to the point where that editor can say "Look at all this material - there is far too much here to delete". In doing this he is glossing over the fact that most of the material used to justify keeping the article is not relevant.
  8. In summary, either there is enough notability and material to justify a standalone article or there isn't. If there is, then let the article stand but confine it to the actual topic in question. If there isn't, then it is better (for the moment) as a redirect.

That's all! No hidden agenda, no vendetta. In contrast to another editor, who is refusing to engage in meaningful debate, trying to bully/bulldoze his way through the opinions of others, and scattering personal attacks about his fellow-editors, based on unwarranted assumptions about their motives, in numerous inappropriate places (the AfD debate, others people's talk pages, etc). Snalwibma 08:12, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

And I link here to my reply to Alansohn on his talk page stating almost identical objetion to those raised by Snalwibma.
Also NBeales own comments on the AfD confirm that he thinks the article should have a broader in scope than just an analysis of Dawkins phrase [1]. Sophia 09:06, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
The topic of this article is (as stated in the header) the philosophical argument introduced by Dawkins. Dawkins himself says that "Ultimate Boeing 747 Gambit" is what he calls the argument. It is not about the phrase. In the same way the article about The God Delusion is about the book not about the phrase "The God Delusion". NBeale 11:23, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
NBeale your post above contradicts itself wildly. The reasons you give for The God Delusion article being the way it is are EXACTLY the reasons this article should confine itself to discussion of article title Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit. The philosophical argument behind it is not Dawkins - he just uses this phrase as his "tag line" for it. If you want to explore the philosophical argument - call the article something else (or place the relevant material in an article that already exists) and then a broader range of sources can be used which should be able to produce a balanced article.
The biggest problem we are having NBeale is that you haven't got straight in your own mind what you are trying to do here. Either that or this really is an attempt to create an article with the express purpose of Dawkins-bashing. I still assume good faith but your contradictory post above does not help. Sophia 12:57, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
  • This is getting funnier at each turn. Having adopted the Humpty-Dumpty stance that the title will mean what he alone wants it to mean, NBeale now tells us (above, here) that Dawkins has the knack of assigning "catchy but misleading titles to things". Let's get this straight. According to NBeale the "ultimate Boeing 747 gambit" is a bad title for "the statistical demonstration that God almost certainly does not exist". In which case it is also a singularly inappropriate title for an article about the statistical demonstration that God almost certainly does not exist. At last, NBeale and I are in agreement. That is exactly my point. Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit is a good title for an article about the phrase and how (whether) it has been taken up by other writers, if there is enough material in that to merit an article. But it is an exceedingly bad title for the wider debate. Unless of course the real purpose of the article is to hold Dawkins up to ridicule. Snalwibma 17:31, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Snalwibma. The article is about what it says it is about! From the very beginning it said: "The "Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit" is an argument for the improbability of the existence of God introduced by Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion". This is one of the few aspects of the article that no-one seems to have reverted. Now probably Dawkins should have called it something like the "Argument from Divine Complexity" - but neither he nor anyone else (notable or un-notable) has done this - there are 0 ghits for this or any similar title! - and by contrast there are over 600 ghits on the title Dawkins used and 8 notable commentators. So perhaps we can agree the following:
  1. It would be absurd to have an article about the phrase.
  2. There is enough material to have an article about the argument
  3. It would have been better if there had been another title for this argument but
  4. Since Dawkins gave it this name, most (but not all, as you rightly pointed out) notable commentators have followed it and no notable source has renamed it yet, we should keep the name for now.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by NBeale (talk • contribs)
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