Talk:List of important publications in chemistry

message: :Two years on we have just rejected the third consecutive new suggestion for textbooks: Cramer, Odian, Branch and Calvin. I think it is time to delete the six texts listed above as well for the reasons already discussed. (And I think 58.164... was BDuke who forgot to login that day? Geolocate says that IP number is in Melbourne.) Dirac66 (talk) 01:27, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with your decisions on deletion to date, and also with the decisions over the last year not to include certain texts. I am less supportive however of the idea that every document in the list needs its own article. The three articles we do have on documents by Boyle, Lavoisier and Gibbs are rather short and could just as well be included as sections of the articles on their authors. And I think most of the other documents are probably mentioned in the articles on their authors - if not, we can always add sections on the documents. There are a few recent documents whose authors do not yet have articles, but perhaps the notability of the document is an argument for the notability of the author as well. Dirac66 (talk) 15:49, 15 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I think I agree with you about publications needing an article. I was really only pointing out that many lists do indeed have that as an inclusion criteria. Lists like "Alumni of XXX" almost always only include people if they are notable enough to have an article. I do think however that more items in the list should have an article. The real aim is to get a source that backs up the reason for inclusion - a source that comments on the publication's importance or influence for example. It may well be likely that an entry is not notable if the author does not warrant an article. The author should be notable because s/he wrote a notable publication that deserves to be in this list. However, there are many academics who warrant an article, yet do not yet have one. We should certainly link to sections of an article that say something of value about the publication, not just a mere mention. All the lists, even after all these years, still do not, at least in part, meet wikipedia guidelines. I think we can trim and add to this list, however, so that it does meet the guidelines. I will have another look at it in a few days. I have an important Wikimedia Australia meeting today. --Bduke  (Discussion) 00:34, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Linking to a section of an existing article (on the author for example) is a good idea, which will often be much faster than starting a new article on the document. Also the articles on the author are often longer and will give more context to the document. As a start I have linked Dalton's work to the article on Dalton, so we now have 4 links to articles.Dirac66 (talk) 02:24, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I looked through the whole list to find existing articles with enough info on the document to justify a link and found 3 more - the articles on Mendeleev and Pauling, and for Watson-Crick a substantial article on the DNA paper itself. So now we have 7 links to articles. For the other documents I think the articles need more information on the document to justify a link. This can be in the document on the author where the information is only a paragraph or three and there is only one author. I am not sure where we should link documents with co-authors of similar notability, such as the book by Cotton and Wilkinson. Dirac66 (talk) 01:52, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Good work. I think we should try to have an article on the Cotton and Wilkinson book, but we need to get the sources together first. The Maths people have articles for books of a similar notability. --Bduke  (Discussion) 03:17, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Reprise 2011

message: I sought the views of a colleague in medicinal chemistry regarding "The Practice of Medicinal Chemistry", Camille Georges Wermuth editor. His reply is interesting: "It is one of a few in the area - nothing particularly notable - but then textbooks are often like that. For a more influential med chem book you might consider Selective Toxicity by Adrien Albert". He is one of the founders of the field so it might be referenced as influential. I'll see if I can take a look. --Bduke  (Discussion) 23:38, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I know nothing of medicinal chemistry books, but this comment would suggest that we include Albert rather than Wermuth. Note also that we have an article on Adrien Albert but not on Wermuth. Dirac66 (talk) 00:34, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Indeed, but I want to look for sources. Albert is Australian so I may be able to find some. --Bduke  (Discussion) 01:07, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I looked at the references in the article on Adrien Albert. The last one at http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/aasmemoirs/albert.htm has interesting comments on Selective Toxicity in the section London Years. Dirac66 (talk) 02:07, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Medicinal chemistry

message: ===Physical Chemistry ===
*Keith Laidler,John Meiser,Bryan Sanctuary
* MCH Multimedia Inc., 5th Ed. 2011, 100% electronic textbook
Description: The latest version (electronic) of this popular undergraduate book in Physical Chemistry comes with embedded multimedia. Easy to use and navigate and integrated into the Internet.
Importance: This book covers all the major topics of Physical Chemistry for undergraduates. It contains 19 chapters and about 100 multimedia interactions. Since it is now published by the Authors and not a book company, the price is considerably lower than hard copy versions. In addition it is available in shorter modules at even lower prices: Thermodynamics (Chpt. 1-6); Electrochemistry (Chpt. 1,7,8); Chemical Kinetics (Chpt. 1, 9, 10); Quantum and spectroscopy (Chpt. 1, 11-14); Statistical Mechanics (Chpt.1, 15); Liquids, Solids and Transport properties (Chpt. 1, 16-19)
This entry is now for debate here whether it should be kept or deleted. The debate will close on 25 July, 2011. Please discuss below.
*Delete. There have been extensive discussions about the notability of general textbooks for the teaching of Physical Chemistry. Please look in the archives linked at the top of this page. This one is no better and no worse than many others, and it does not seem to have any really important influence. The Importance: justification above makes not claim of importance. At this stage, I do not think that this entry can be retained. It also looks to me like the Importance: and Description: sections above might be a copy of the official blurb for the book but I can not find them. This is just my feeling as they read like an official blurb. --Bduke  (Discussion) 00:16, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I missed the COI! Very obvious. --Bduke  (Discussion) 07:40, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Physical Chemistry

message: *Keith Laidler,John Meiser,Bryan Sanctuary
* MCH Multimedia Inc., 5th Ed. 2011, 100% electronic textbook
Description: The latest version (electronic) of this popular undergraduate book in Physical Chemistry comes with embedded multimedia. Easy to use and navigate and integrated into the Internet.
Importance: This book covers all the major topics of Physical Chemistry for undergraduates. It contains 19 chapters and about 100 multimedia interactions. Since it is now published by the Authors and not a book company, the price is considerably lower than hard copy versions. In addition it is available in shorter modules at even lower prices: Thermodynamics (Chpt. 1-6); Electrochemistry (Chpt. 1,7,8); Chemical Kinetics (Chpt. 1, 9, 10); Quantum and spectroscopy (Chpt. 1, 11-14); Statistical Mechanics (Chpt.1, 15); Liquids, Solids and Transport properties (Chpt. 1, 16-19)
This entry is now for debate here whether it should be kept or deleted. The debate will close on 25 July, 2011. Please discuss below.
*Delete. There have been extensive discussions about the notability of general textbooks for the teaching of Physical Chemistry. Please look in the archives linked at the top of this page. This one is no better and no worse than many others, and it does not seem to have any really important influence. The Importance: justification above makes not claim of importance. At this stage, I do not think that this entry can be retained. It also looks to me like the Importance: and Description: sections above might be a copy of the official blurb for the book but I can not find them. This is just my feeling as they read like an official blurb. --Bduke  (Discussion) 00:16, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I missed the COI! Very obvious. --Bduke  (Discussion) 07:40, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: ''[http://www.mchmultimedia.com/store/Physical-Chemistry-ebooks.html Physical Chemistry ]''

message: A perennial issue on this and similar pages is how to set criteria for the list. I have carefully considered existing guidelines and tried to craft a broad set of policies that satisfy them. I have posted it on the Science pearls talk page. I would welcome your comments. Of course, these guidelines are not intended to be binding for any particular page, but might help you choose your own selection criteria. RockMagnetist (talk) 00:08, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed selection criteria