# Question deleted?!1234567890

what the hell?! I had a Phys.SE question about regularization that had a beautiful answer by a kind user named tparker and a moderator migrated it to Math.SE!

I cant help but think moderators are intentionally targetting me trying to prevent me from asking questions about regularization.

This is getting ridiculous

Question: how does one ask a question related to regularization without it getting deleted?

Am i seriously being screwed with?

• If you're referring to this question, it was moved to Mathematics. (And I had nothing to do with it.) Please try to get your facts straight before making these sorts of accusations. – David Z Jul 10 '16 at 15:50
• @DavidZ is regularization not a physics topic or something?? I had a wonderful answer by an actual kind and helpful person here and now i cant review it.... – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 15:53
• Five people thought your question wasn't about physics. As our help center says, "Questions on mathematical details outside of physical context are off topic," so presumably your question didn't have enough physical context. Also, "can't review it" is nonsense; the answer is sitting over on Mathematics. I know you're aware of the migrated question; did you miss the fact that the answer traveled with it? – David Z Jul 10 '16 at 15:59
• @DavidZ all i see is your comment and the 2 above it and nothing else. Am i to understand that mathematical physics is not a topic in physics according the physics SE? – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:03
• Because i usually see a TON of questions involving mathematical physics...yet im singled out. Should i delete this account and sign up with a new one to hide my ide tity so people stop messing with me? – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:04
• Btw i am a physicist, not a mathematician....i think that's the case for most of us here.... – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:05
• Look below the comments for the answers. I doubt that changing your account would make much of a difference because nobody is paying much attention to who posts these questions, they're just reacting to the questions themselves. Maybe if you post a similar question again, people won't notice it, but that's just as likely to happen on your current account. – David Z Jul 10 '16 at 16:12
• @DavidZ well i dont know what else to do....i post questions about regularization and people say they're not allowed. I post questions about other topics and they dont get messed with. This is all so ridiculous – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:14
• @DavidZ this is what a question in mathematics looks like (there is NO physics) math.stackexchange.com/q/1854648/353149 – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:16
• And it seems like math people are MUCH kinder and more helpful than some of the physics people..... – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:17
• If people tell you your questions about regularization are off topic, then it would be reasonable for you to conclude that questions about regularization are off topic, and stop posting them here. It seems like that's all there is to it, unless I'm missing something? – David Z Jul 10 '16 at 16:21
• @DavidZ youre missing the fact that other users seem to be allowed to post about regularization. I posted a meta question about if regularization is not a physics topic despite it being in ALL books on quantum field theory. So im waiting for that answer. My understanding is that there is no way to ask other users questions directly and so we use meta to try and obtain bureaucratic help – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:25
• Make sense? It's also the reason i asked this question. I.e. how come my regularization questions get messed with whereas others seem to have no problems. – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:28
• – David Z Jul 10 '16 at 16:29
• @DavidZ no thank you. I do not have time for that. – user122066 Jul 10 '16 at 16:31

This question was migrated to Math.SE for various reason, e.g.:

1. the first subquestion was:

Are ALL infinite sums not divergent?

The most natural interpretation of this question (and the one used in the answer) is that OP is asking if an infinite series a_1+a_2+... can be divergent. This appears to be a pure math question.

2. The second subquestion was:

If not then how can one determine whether a sum is divergent or not?

This also appears to be pure math question. Moreover, it is preferred to only ask one subquestion per post cf. this meta discussion.

In general one criteria for a math question to belong to Phys.SE is that it is put in a physics context, and one could argue this was not done to a sufficient degree for OP's question.

Concerning the on-topicness of the subject of , see this meta discussion.

Your question, 'Are all infinite sums not divergent?' (revision history, timeline), was migrated to the Mathematics Stack Exchange site, and it is available here, along with both of its answers. There is no useful or reasonable sense of the word "deleted" that applies to this question. It has simply been moved to a place where, in the opinion of a quorum of 3k+ rep users of this site, it is more likely to receive appropriate attention and good answers.

To be clear, questions on regularization (along with many other topics of mathematical physics) are on-topic on this site. However, not all questions on mathematical physics (including regularization) are on-topic.

As an extreme case, if a question asks for a proof of a general mathematical statement and it is completely devoid of physics context, then it is best posted on the maths site. As another extreme case, if a question deals with the application of a specific mathematical tool to a given physical problem, then it is clearly on topic here. In between the two there is a large gray area.

Some previous discussions in this meta site on where the line should be drawn inside this gray area are

Please have a careful look at the opinions voiced in those posts (and this applies to everyone reading this post, OP, mods and 3kers alike). It is also important to note that opinions on this topic are very divided, with many posts at score 0 through routes like +5-5 or more. You can see the upvote/downvote breakdown of a score by clicking on the score if you're 1k-rep or above (for performance reasons); if you can't do that yet you can use this SEDE query (using the post Id, the first number in the url from the share button), or this, this or this userscripts.

In general, if a question is purely about mathematical aspects of a mathematical tool or topic, it is generally considered off-topic here (i.e. it is migrated to the maths site, not deleted), regardless of how applicable it is to physics. (As an extreme example, linear algebra is useful for physics, but questions exclusively about linear algebra are off-topic here. Similarly so with other tools of mathematical physics.) Personally, I feel your question is squarely in that category.

(There are some questions, on the other hand, where the topic is mathematics but there are various reasons to expect that physicists would be better equipped to answer the question, and there is some debate on whether those should be migrated or not. However, I don't think this applies at all to your question, which explicitly thanks a mathematician for its foundation.)

As an aside, it is important to realize that most of the moderation on this site is not performed by the formal moderators (which are identified by a ♦ after their username, together with Stack Exchange team members). For details, see A theory of moderation, but the short story is that most question closures and migrations are community actions, and they require the agreement of five community members. Blaming "a moderator" for things like this is simply not helpful - particularly when question closures and migrations are openly and clearly attributed. (In particular, if a question is migrated, go to the page on the new site, look for the banner that says, 'migrated from $site', and click on the$site link.) Other useful tools for inspecting the moderation history of a post are the revision history (https://physics.stackexchange.com/posts/$PostId/revisions) and the post timeline (https://physics.stackexchange.com/posts/$PostId/timeline).