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When reviewing close vote queues I frequently encounter cases of several close votes on questions that have received one or more more or less elaborate answers, frequently with several upvotes each. Thus if the question will indeed be closed, I believe valuable effort and information would be lost. Naturally in such cases I vote to leave open. Presumably at least in some of these cases the answers were given after the downvotes. Could it be sensible to add a rule that would nullify close votes if there is certain amount of positive score from subsequent answers? Say, automatically leave the question open if the total of the question score (which might well be very negative) and all answer scores is positive? Plus also maybe weighing by close votes in some way...

I mean, in any case I believe we cannot afford losing any stuff with score that is positive in total, can we?

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    $\begingroup$ Nothing is lost when a question is closed, only when a question is deleted. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 27 at 6:23
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    $\begingroup$ A question should be closed based on the merits of the question, not based on any answers. $\endgroup$
    – Emil Jeřábek
    Commented Aug 27 at 7:23
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    $\begingroup$ @GerryMyerson This is only true for users with enough reputation, no? $\endgroup$
    – მამუკა ჯიბლაძე
    Commented Aug 27 at 12:14
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    $\begingroup$ @EmilJeřábek I would rather value primarily the useful information that the question together with the answers contain. For example, it might happen that the question is poorly formulated and the answer among other things clarifies what exactly was meant to be asked $\endgroup$
    – მამუკა ჯიბლაძე
    Commented Aug 27 at 12:16
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    $\begingroup$ mathoverflow.net/help/closed-questions says nothing to indicate information is lost to anyone when a question is closed. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 27 at 13:08
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    $\begingroup$ If an answer indicates how a question can be remedied to make it a good question, the question should be edited to reflect that, at which point it will no longer be close-worthy. And no, closed questions can be seen by everybody as usual, this does not require any reputation. As Gerry already wrote, only deleted questions are invisible to users with less than 10k reputation. Also note that a question cannot be deleted if it has a positively scored answer. $\endgroup$
    – Emil Jeřábek
    Commented Aug 27 at 13:08
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    $\begingroup$ Oh I see, sorry for my misunderstanding. I am not sure anymore whether my question makes sense. Still it can be useful to explain all this in an answer, in case there is somebody else misguided like me... $\endgroup$
    – მამუკა ჯიბლაძე
    Commented Aug 27 at 15:36
  • $\begingroup$ "a question cannot be deleted if it has a positive scored answer"? I believe moderators can, and have done this. $\endgroup$
    – Jukka Kohonen
    Commented Sep 4 at 4:52

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