The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus‎. ✗plicit 12:54, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Harry Kloor (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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Reads a lot like a resume, tangentially mentioned in a few RS. Article may have been made for payment. PlotinusEnjoyer (talk) 19:18, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. PlotinusEnjoyer (talk) 19:18, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Actors and filmmakers, Authors, Businesspeople, Science fiction and fantasy, Television, Comics and animation, Science, Indiana, and Oregon. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 21:15, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. Making an accusation that the creator of the article, MichaelQSchmidt, a Wikipedia Administrator with over 61,000 non-automated edits, is an undisclosed paid editor is a pretty bold statement. Aside from that, the subject of the article meets WP:CREATIVE #3 for his role as producer, co-director, and writer of Quantum Quest: A Cassini Space Odyssey and possibly for Earth: Final Conflict but I haven't been able to independently verify his involvement in that series (but I haven't tried very hard). RecycledPixels (talk) 22:52, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment: The tone is promotional, but if one is going to claim paid advertising, then one needs to prove it. The issue is whether the tone can be fixed by ordinary editing. That's all. Bearian (talk) 05:19, 15 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment as nominator- the article has had the banner claiming it was made for payment since 2022. I had assumed that there was some official process that determines that; I am a new editor. I don't claim to have evidence that the article was paid for: I mean no harm to MichaelQSchmidt. PlotinusEnjoyer (talk) 04:16, 16 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment - Live and learn. Here's what happened, and a good learning curve on this one. The article was created in 2008. It wasn't until 2022 that it was tagged for possible paid editing. With a gap of 14 years, how would anyone know it was paid editing? You see, when articles get tagged for anything, and without any backup proof, a tag is just a tag unless there is some proof. — Maile (talk) 03:03, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Allow me, please, to disagree with your observation about the importance of the length of time, i.e. "With a gap of 14 years, how would anyone know it was paid editing?" Well, information does not necessarily appear quickly. We might learn an article was made by a paid editor, or some other pertinent information, a considerable length of time after the article's creation, something for which I believe no examples need be given. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 16:38, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• I might also add that anyone can slap a tag on an article. They don't have to prove the tag is correct, or that they even know why they are tagging. Just tag it. — Maile (talk) 03:18, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ✗plicit 00:17, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep Creative career clearly pushes subject above WP:N easily, and the claim the article was created and paid for by the subject is based on...one drive-by IP post in 2022, with @MrOllie: needing to explain why they tagged it in August of the same year. It's an accusation so poor nobody commented on it because they presented no evidence for it at all. After your poor Chanel and Travel Portland noms and this removed vote!, Plotinus, I strongly suggest doing more in article space right now because your nominations and rationales are baffling. Nathannah•(chatter) 01:22, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • The template says 'created or edited' and that is the case here - there's been a promotional SPA active on it for years - as is common in these cases, it is photo rights on their uploads that tell the tale. It's not based on an IP post, and I did not have MichaelQSchmidt in mind. - MrOllie (talk) 01:27, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • I worked out which account's edits you were responding to. ☺ Uncle G (talk) 01:53, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • It was commented on. Uncle G (talk) 01:53, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete since subject despite the avalanche of citations, the supporting material does not stand up to close scrutiny. Scalpel, please.

Forensics: We can all agree that our subject is the first to obtain a double doctorate, per All the News That's Fit to Print, and by some obscure Russian website, for good measure - though, we must discard the dead links about that double doctorate stuff, such as this Arizona roadkill.

What else do we have? We have listings on a general theme, in which our subject is mentioned, such as this list of alumni, or routine listings of events, e.g. of speaking appearances, such as this; plus, news items that are similarly about something else and not of our subject, e.g. this report about an upcoming movie, whose screenplay is written by Kloor (mentioned once), or this one about a NASA project where our subject is listed as "workshop attendee", or a Captain's Log entry on a "Star Trek interactive science exhibit" where our subject is name dropped once, and so on. Anything else trawled up belongs to the aforepresented categories.

The strong aroma of vanity, whether intentional or not, is not a problem. After all, anyone can see there is no need for two photo-portraits or that we do not get year of birth. Nor is the fact that a major curator of the text is a kamikaze account. The problem is that we do not have enough sources. And arguments to the tune "Oh, he's obviously notable" do not wash. -The Gnome (talk) 16:38, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Whether or not there was UPE, we still need to have an outcome on this discussion and right now there is no consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 01:06, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete. Getting a double doctorate simultaneously is interesting, but not particularly notable IMO. There doesn't seem to be a lot of significant sourcing on his other accomplishments. Clarityfiend (talk) 10:55, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Did you look for sourcing? Coresly (talk) 21:16, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Yes. What part of "There doesn't seem to be a lot of significant sourcing on his other accomplishments" didn't you understand? Clarityfiend (talk) 23:38, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Well, it’s really easy to say there isn’t any of something without actually looking for it. I’m asking you to tell us what you did find. Coresly (talk) 00:09, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Coresly, you demand from Clarityfiend to produce proof of a negative, which is literally impossible. On the other hand, refuting Clarityfiend's claim is trivially easy: All you have to do is produce sources. In so many words, the onus is on the party that asserts sources exist. -The Gnome (talk) 13:17, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources. The subject passes Wikipedia:Notability (people)#Basic criteria, which says:

  People are presumed notable if they have received significant coverage in multiple published secondary sources that are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject.

  • If the depth of coverage in any given source is not substantial, then multiple independent sources may be combined to demonstrate notability; trivial coverage of a subject by secondary sources is not usually sufficient to establish notability.

  Sources

  1. Edwards, Gavin (2021). Bad Motherfucker: The Life and Movies of Samuel L. Jackson, the Coolest Man in Hollywood. New York: Hachette Books. ISBN 978-0-306-92430-9. Retrieved 2025-03-02 – via Google Books.

     The book notes: "Weirder than any of those never-happened projects was an animated film that was over a decade in the making (and depending on how you think about it, still might not be finished): Quantum Quest: A Cassini Space Odyssey. Co-director Harry Kloor was a double PhD (in physics and chemistry) who had a personality better suited to Hollywood than the academy; he touted his multiple black belts in modern martial arts and his Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo sports car. Kloor wrote for the TV show Star Trek: Voyager-and in 1996, he was approached by NASA and JPL to see if he could make an educational film about the Cassini-Huygens mission (a probe, launched in 1997, that ended up in orbit around Saturn to collect massive amounts of data on the gas giant and its rings). ... Kloor wrote a script for a sixty-five-minute educational movie, called Quantum Quest, about the adventures of Dave the Photon; working all his contacts and leaning hard on educational angle, Kloor recruited an improbably high-caliber cast of Hollywood talent who worked for scale, recording voice performances for under a thousand dollars each, including John Travolta, Christian Slater, Sarah Michelle Gellar, James Earl Jones, and Samuel L. Jackson."

  2. Hevesi, Dennis (1994-08-08). "Purdue Student, in a First, Earns a Double Doctorate". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2024-01-18. Retrieved 2025-03-02.

     The article notes: "As 800 graduates crossed the stage in the Purdue Hall of Music in West Lafayette, Ind., the procession halted as 31-year-old Harry Kloor, of Portland, Ore., was double-hooded with two blue, black and gold hoods -- one for his Ph.D. in physics, the other for his Ph.D. in chemistry. ... It was nothing new to Mr. Kloor. In 1986, he earned simultaneous bachelor's degrees, also in physics and chemistry, graduating summa cum laude from Southern Oregon State College."

  3. "Doctor, doctor". People. Vol. 42, no. 8. 1994-08-22. p. 120. EBSCOhost 9408227588.

     The article notes: "Albert Einstein had just one Ph.D. British physicist Stephen Hawking, no slouch himself, has just one Ph.D. Harry Kloor has two Ph.D.'s. And he earned them at the same time. Kloor, 31, scored his remarkable simultaneous double -- in physics and chemistry -- at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., earlier this month, becoming, as far as anyone can determine, the first American to accomplish such a feat. ... The third of four sons whose father was a drapery installer, Kloor was born with both feet pointing backward and spent years wearing metal braces and special shoes. "He was just determined," says his mother, Mary Gray, 65, who remarried after she and Kloor's father divorced and who worked at various times as a nurse's aide, seamstress and bookkeeper. "Nothing ever got him down.""

  4. Quinones, Eric R. (1994-08-09). "Double doctorate makes student a star". The Herald. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 2025-03-02. Retrieved 2025-03-02 – via Newspapers.com.

     The article notes: "Kloor was born with a condition that left him unable to walk until age 7. He has since recovered "110 percent" and credits his father, who died Christmas Day when Kloor was 13, and his mother, who worked as an accountant and a nurse's assistant, for inspiring him to excel. Kloor wants to use his technical knowledge and creativity to work with Fortune 500 companies and Hollywood studios to increase the public's understanding of science. And he wants to serve in the U.S. Congress - though he's lived in Indiana, Oregon, California, Washington and Nevada and doesn't know which state he would represent."

  5. Hoffman, Jascha (2009-10-14). "Q&A: The space entrepreneur". Nature. doi:10.1038/461885a. ProQuest 204559150.

     The article notes: "After completing simultaneous doctorates in physics and chemistry, Harry Kloor became a space-exploration consultant and film-maker. As his three-dimensional animated feature Quantum Quest — made with real footage from the Cassini spacecraft — is previewed in New York, Kloor shares his thoughts on manned space flight and the use of prizes to motivate adventurous science."

  6. Lewinski, John Scott (September 2009). "Film School". Popular Science. Vol. 275, no. 3. p. 32. ProQuest 222952774. Archived from the original on 2009-09-11. Retrieved 2025-03-02.

     The article notes: "Harry Kloor may be the world's most well-rounded nerd. He is the only person to have earned doctorates in physics and chemistry simultaneously, and he has penned episodes of Star Trek: Voyager. And when NASA asked him for help in improving its image with young people, he drew on both of those experiences. The best way to get kids enthused about outer space, Kloor figured, was to hide their medicine in a bucket of popcorn."

  There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow Harry Kloor to pass Wikipedia:Notability#General notability guideline, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject".

  Cunard (talk) 04:56, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• The policies say that articles containing flaws should not be deleted if they can be improved. Wikipedia:Deletion policy#Alternatives to deletion says, If editing can address all relevant reasons for deletion, this should be done rather than deleting the page. Wikipedia:Editing policy#Wikipedia is a work in progress: perfection is not required says, Perfection is not required: Wikipedia is a work in progress. Collaborative editing means that incomplete or poorly written first drafts can evolve over time into excellent articles. Even poor articles, if they can be improved, are welcome. Cunard (talk) 04:56, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• With all due respect to Cunard's typically diligent work, I do not see our subject satisfying Wikipedia's requirements for inclusion. Let's take a closer look at the newly proffered links.

More forensics, then: The book Bad Motherfucker is about Samuel L. Jackson. And in it, our subject gets a paragraph about his (short) presence in Hollywood. So, one more link that is not about our subject.

The archived Popular Science article is about the release of the William Shatner-starring film Quantum Quest, for which Kloor is interviewed.

The New York Times' article relates the one event for which our subject is known, i.e. the double PhD. We already have tons of that pyrotechnic. Typical WP:BIO1E. I made sure to point out that almost all extant links point to that one, singular event. But, still, we are presented with more, e.g. the 1994 People magazine, another NYT article, and one more from the Herald. All dated 1994, unsurprisingly. Well, for the umpteenth time, no one disputes the 1994 double-PhD award! It's a fact. But can the recipient get a Wikipedia article on the basis of that one achievement?

So, apologies to my esteemed colleague, but "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" does not suffice. The "significant coverage" must, above all else, be about our subject. And we do not have that; not in the quality and quantity required. -The Gnome (talk) 13:40, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.