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I would like to hear the views of PSE community members on the deletion of my two upvoted answers to this question. I am especially interested in the views of ordinary (non-moderator) members of the PSE community

Please note that the questioner already had the answer to their problem, as well as an explanation of the answer. They did not think the explanation was correct because it involved accelerating reference frames.

I made one post showing how the answer to the problem could be derived using relative motion, without invoking reference frames. In the comments I said that although the particles were indeed accelerating relative to each other, this was irrelevant. The questioner still seemed perplexed, so I posted a second approach that reached the same conclusion without using relative motion at all, although it did require a knowledge of calculus.

My two answers received three and four upvotes respectively, and no down votes.

Ten hours after I gave my answers, the question was closed and my answers were both deleted. The justification given for deleting my posts was that the questioner had not explicitly asked for alternative solutions to the problem so "this is not an answer". Please note that I am not asking for comments on the closure of the question, only on the deletion of my answers.

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The question you were responding to was focused on understanding the motion of one of the particles in the frame of another:

So, why according to particle A, particle B is in uniform motion? What happens to their acceleration vectors while frames are changed?

Your answers amount to "let's ignore what happens to particle $B$'s acceleration in the frame of particle $A$ and find their speed instead." While your answers may be interesting in their own right, they aren't answers to the question, so in my opinion ACuriousMind was correct to delete them.

It's also worth noting that if the original problem was "when do these particles converge," it probably would have been closed as a homework question and the answers removed as complete answers to a homework question.

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    $\begingroup$ Agreed. The OP provided interesting approaches but they do not answer the question. $\endgroup$
    – ZeroTheHero
    Sep 30, 2020 at 12:52
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    $\begingroup$ Edit suggestion: I think you should remove the last paragraph in your answer. While that para may be interesting in its own right, it is not related to the question that is asked. $\endgroup$
    – Razor
    Oct 1, 2020 at 5:55
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    $\begingroup$ @Razor It is relevant; it gives another reason as to why the answers should have been deleted $\endgroup$
    – BioPhysicist
    Oct 1, 2020 at 9:58
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First, let me start off by saying that moderators have a really good knowledge of site policy and how it should be implemented. Therefore, I would think that you would actually want to hear from moderators to learn more about what is/isn't allowed on the site. Your "question" looks more like an attempt just to see who will go against the moderators and site policy with you rather than learn something, but I digress.

What are the views of PSE community members on moderator deletion of upvoted answers?

If a moderator has a good reason to do this, then I see no issue with it. Votes are not necessarily an indication of policy adherence. Note that I also don't think that answers with downvotes should necessarily be deleted. The votes on an answer, whether net positive or negative, shouldn't impact whether or not something should be deleted.

I would like to hear the views of PSE community members on the deletion of my two upvoted answers to this question. I am especially interested in the views of ordinary (non-moderator) members of the PSE community

I agree with the decision and the reason. The question should have been closed in the first place and should not received any answers. Now, just because a question should be closed doesn't mean all of the answers it gets before closure should be deleted, but questions that should be closed tend to have answers that also do not follow site policy (which I suppose is one reason why they should be closed). Instead of seeing a question and just making an answer because you can, you should first think whether or not the question is on topic for PSE. Given your reputation and history on the site, I would think you would have a good feel for this and would have known that this wasn't a good question for PSE, and thus didn't deserve an answer.

Furthermore, independent of the question, supplying solutions to calculations and exercises like this question is also not allowed. Given your reputation and history on the site, I thought you would be more aware of this as well.

Therefore, your answers created the "perfect storm". I agree with the moderators that you were not answering the question that was asked. Additionaly, you were providing solutions to an exercise. So take your pick as to which deletion reason you want, but I think either one is valid.

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