Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal

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Welcome to WikiProject Paranormal, a WikiProject that aims to provide a framework for the improvement and organization of articles related to the paranormal, anomalous phenomena and other similar areas. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask us on our discussion page.

Anyone is welcome to join by listing their username on the /Participants page and contributing to the project. Make sure to put our discussion page to your watchlist so you're notified of new discussions. Watchlisting Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal/Article alerts and Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Paranormal is also strongly recommended.

Goals

To provide a concise and accurate record of notable beliefs, organizations, experiments, individuals and events which are associated with the paranormal, including their history, background and their current status.
To provide a framework (including infoboxes, categories, and examples of Best Practice) from within which scholarly entries about the paranormal, and related topics, may be produced.
To provide a scholarly set of terminology to describe the paranormal which is technically, culturally, and contextually accurate.
To seek out and apply verifiable mainstream sources to pages within the projects scope with the aim of A) addressing any issues of verifiability and reliability that have been highlighted in existing entries, and B) ensuring that new entries are of sufficient quality that their verifiability and reliability do not become an issue.
To ensure that each entry approaches its topic from a balanced and neutral perspective.
To ensure that the notability of each topic can be gleaned from its entry, without the need for additional explanation.
To ensure that a clear dividing line is established between reporting the belief in/background of the topic in a scholarly manner, and advocating/denouncing the topic itself.
To expand project stubs to full entries and to progress full entries to the next level.
Patrol frequently vandalized pages within the project's scope.

Scope

Paranormal articles by quality and importance
Quality	Importance
Quality	Top	High	Mid	Low	NA	???	Total
FA			3	5		2	10
FL				1			1
GA		1	5	15		5	26
B	6	20	29	63		59	177
C	8	13	55	153		105	334
Start	1	7	53	322		479	862
Stub			4	74		185	263
List	1	4	11	26		15	57
Category					698		698
Disambig					9		9
File					17		17
Project					20		20
Template					20		20
NA		1	3	14	139		157
Other					5		5
Assessed	16	46	163	673	908	850	2,656
Unassessed				2		31	33
Total	16	46	163	675	908	881	2,689
WikiWork factors (?)		ω = 7,807			Ω = 4.67

(Assessment log)

Subjects covered by this project include (but are not necessarily limited to):

Anomalistics
Cryptozoology
Paranormal phenomena
Paranormal hoaxes and frauds
Parapsychology
Fringe science, protoscience, and pseudoscience
Ufology
Urban myths and legends
unexplained disappearances
Some conspiracy theories
megaliths and similar

The beginnings of a list of topics which are covered in reference books directly related to this topic can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal/Encyclopedic articles.

Recognized content

The following articles fall within the scope of the project and have been noted for their outstanding quality. Project members are encouraged use them as examples of good practice and to note their different writing and organizational styles.

Full list: Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal/Recognized content

This is a list of recognized content, updated weekly by JL-Bot (talk · contribs) (typically on Saturdays). There is no need to edit the list yourself. If an article is missing from the list, make sure it is tagged (e.g. {{WikiProject Paranormal}}) or categorized correctly and wait for the next update. See WP:RECOG for configuration options.

Featured articles

Featured lists

List of dates predicted for apocalyptic events

Good articles

Featured pictures

Líneas de Nazca, Nazca, Perú, 2015-07-29, DD 49

Featured article candidates

Roswell incident

Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team release version selections

Reincarnation

To-do

Figure out what to do with old to-do lists...

Article alerts

Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal/Article alerts:

Articles for deletion

24 Oct 2024 – List of West Virginia cryptids (talk · edit · hist) was AfDed by Fiveby (t · c); see discussion (9 participants; relisted)

Proposed deletions

26 Oct 2024 – Million Fax on Washington (talk · edit · hist) was PRODed by Nayyn (t · c): This event appears to be a lobbying activity on behalf of one organization. There does not appear to have been much news activity on this, beyond the lobbying group itself. According to the sources available, it did not appear to create a protest or ...

Redirects for discussion

30 Oct 2024 – List of Familiar spirits in popular culture (talk · edit · hist) →Familiar was RfDed by Utopes (t · c); see discussion

Deletion sorting

Paranormal articles for deletion:

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Shortcut

WP:AFD/WOO

Paranormal deletion

List of West Virginia cryptids

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

One good source for mothman, others are WBOY-TV and a local station's site w/ news. Only list of cryptids for a state, don't see categories or lists by country. Removed some sources before nominating. fiveby(zero) 22:01, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Paranormal and Mythology. fiveby(zero) 22:01, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of West Virginia-related deletion discussions. jlwoodwa (talk) 01:58, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. jlwoodwa (talk) 01:59, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

*Keep Sadly, *Merge to West Virginia folklore (as this is slightly more isefull overall. ~~but this could be useful~~ as I was not even aware the Snallygaster was a real myth, so it has been informative, I suppose a push Merge with list of cryptids.But I can see why a more local list could have use. Slatersteven (talk) 09:35, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. There's no particular need for there to be other articles or lists by state in order for this one to exist; others could just as easily be created if they're supported by reliable sources. The question is whether reliable sources for the creatures on this list exist, not whether they're currently cited. There will obviously be lots of sources for Mothman and the Flatwoods Monster, not as sure about the others. But I'm pretty sure a search will turn up news articles about some of them, and I've seen books on West Virginia folklore that presumably mention more than these two—I seem to recall one with the Flatwoods Monster on the cover—and it's not a requirement that sources be available over the internet. A trip to the library may be in order, but remember, there's no deadline to improve articles, and that's what this is: an article in need of improved sourcing, not one that's impossible to source. P Aculeius (talk) 13:38, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Folklore should go into West Virginia folklore and better lists would might be folklore creatures by country or maybe even state. That is a big problem with some of these articles, they turn 'folklore' into 'cryptids' and use and attract a lot of dubious sources to do it. Anyway made some more edits to the list article. fiveby(zero) 14:30, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

All of your numerous edits—besides nominating the article for deletion—have been deletion of material from the article: around 2,000 bytes so far. It looks like you're attempting deletion piece-by-piece so that you can make the argument that there's not enough left to keep! That's not how this should work. Did you look for sources, or just delete the ones that didn't meet your personal inclusion criteria, and then all of the items that were no longer sufficiently supported by the remaining sources? I note that in one case, you deleted an item because the cited source didn't call it a "cryptid". It may be that this article is mis-titled, and it would be better called something like "monsters of West Virginia" or "monsters and creatures of folklore from West Virginia". That's not an argument for deletion—but it seems to be providing the basis for shrinking the list in support of deleting it! Chopping up a short article that you yourself nominated for deletion—within a day of its creation, and without any attempt to identify issues that might be addressed by means short of deletion, or sources that could be added—seems like a poor way of dealing with a new article. P Aculeius (talk) 16:31, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I thought i was attempting deletion by AfD no? Everyone can see my edits in the history and disagree or not—and edit the article. I kinda remember letting everyone know i had made edits, lets see: Removed some sources before nominating and just above Anyway made some more edits to the list article. I did not really look for sources, thought it hardly worth the effort. Did note an ISBN in an edit summary if anyone wants to try and find it. There is one source there which collects a West Virginia list of cryptids. I nominated, as i thought i had said in the above, because it was a one-of-a-kind when there are no country lists even. There's some disagreement as to whether there should be a main list at all.

It's not my "personal inclusion criteria" but my best interpretation of other peoples. If you disagree, go revert. I've dug through plenty of sources looking at cryptids and argued to keep occasionally. Just don't like calling a deer a horse. fiveby(zero) 17:23, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. It's true this is a first-of-its-kind list for cryptids specifying a state, but it does create a useful resource and fits in with other research info about West Virginia. See Category:West Virginia-related lists, and Category:West_Virginia_history-related_lists. 5Q5|^✉ 13:41, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to West Virginia folklore. These aren't notable things requiring their own list, they're just ghost stories. Reywas92^Talk 14:38, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Merge (the sources at least) to West Virginia folklore. This was an unnecessary spinoff that doesn't serve any purpose. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 21:54, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delete.~~, weak support~~~~. There may be a world in which this list could be salvaged. As it stands, t~~The list itself is not clearly notable and the flurry of recent edits have led to a massive removal of items and references. These removals are appropriate. I'm not too concerned about the reliability of a local TV news station for individual cryptids, although it additional sources would be stronger. The bigger issues is the notability of the list itself. I also weakly ~~oppose outright~~support selectively merging with West Virginia folklore on the basis of the concern about editors blurring the line between folklore and cryptids. Individual cases or references that warrant inclusion can be manually incorporated into WV folklore.--MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 20:59, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Amending to full support for deletion after further consideration of the comments made by others and issues on pages for related topics. My top concern is the lack of notability for the topic itself. A close second is the lack of selection criteria for this list specifically and the lack of clear definition of cryptid generally.--MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 18:30, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and/or Merge anything of value into West Virginia folklore without the use of pseudoscientific terminology like cryptid. These are all entities from folklore — the cryptozoology coat of paint is WP:PROFRINGE — and we already have the extremely dubious list of cryptids with no criteria. :bloodofox: (talk) 21:47, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. Doing a WP:GTEST I found these mainstream sources (including Skeptical Inquirer) all using the term "cryptid" in their reporting on West Virginia. None is currently used in the article as I write this: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12]. 5Q5|^✉ 12:38, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 23:07, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Membership

To join, sign your name at the /Participants page and add the main page to your watchlist. Members can add the following userboxes to identify themselves as members of the project. A list of members with these userboxes is available at Category:WikiProject Paranormal participants.

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Templates

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Stub templates

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{{Paranormal-stub}}
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{{Cryptozoology-stub}}, {{Cryptid-stub}}
Parapsychology stub -
{{Para-psych-stub}}
Mythology stub -
{{Myth-stub}}
{{UFO-stub}}
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Boilerplate templates

Feel free to use these templates where appropriate. Any major changes should be brought up on the template talk page.

Paranormal Unassessed

	This article falls under the scope of WikiProject Paranormal, which aims to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to the paranormal and related topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the attached article, help with current tasks, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and discussions.ParanormalWikipedia:WikiProject ParanormalTemplate:WikiProject Paranormalparanormal articles
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This user is a part of WikiProject Paranormal, which aims to improve Wikipedia's coverage of the paranormal. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.

{{blackproject}} - Notice placed on talk pages of articles that discuss black projects — "highly classified military/defense projects, unacknowledged publicly by the government, military personnel, or defense contractors"

This article deals with a military black project.

Because of the nature of such projects, the most authoritative sources (any involved governments and defense contractors) may not even acknowledge its existence. The most reliable sources may be highly speculative.

Please ensure that the article is well and reliably sourced and does not contain unverifiable information or vague predictions.
For more details, see the black project working group of the military history project.

Infoboxes templates

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({{Infobox mythical creature}})
Abductees, contactees, writers, researchers, etc -
({{Infobox person}})
Paranormal events -
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Barnstar

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		The Paranormal Barnstar, awarded to users who have made a notable contribution to the project

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Wikipedia:WikiProject Paranormal

Goals

Scope

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Featured articles

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Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team release version selections

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Paranormal deletion

List of West Virginia cryptids

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