Back to News
Advertisement
Advertisement

⚡ Community Insights

Discussion Sentiment

58% Positive

Analyzed from 2265 words in the discussion.

Trending Topics

#fraud#caught#more#evil#should#makes#mistake#paper#don#themselves

Discussion (83 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

beambot4 days ago
Sayre's Law: Academic Politics Are So Vicious Because the Stakes Are So Small

Maybe universities, tenure committees, and funding sources should stop measuring academics by vanity metrics such as H-Index and publication counts. And don't get me started on the tendency toward "minimum publishable units."

That said, abusing power as an editor deserves a special place in hell...

denverllc4 days ago
The stakes are pretty large now. You are judged on the number of publications, positions, citations, etc.

It’s not even about philosophical disagreement as much as future career

Forgeties793 days ago
Corporate KPI-chasing culture ruins everything. “Publish or perish” has hit such an extreme level.

I imagine most academics would gladly not participate in this game if their entire livelihood didn’t depend on it

raxxorraxor3 days ago
Every serious academic knows it is complete crap, the problem is finding a better metric. Although the crappyness competes with "no metric at all" and I think the latter would be superior.

The only advantage the current system has is that it is stupendously simple, so at least it is hard to manipulate.

kiba3 days ago
Institutional design needs legibility to track people's reputation at scale. The problem is that these metrics are often poor substitutes.

The difficulty is that nobody knows how to. My guess is that if you want good signaling, you'll need to find something that is difficult to fake. My guess are evolving benchmarks that measure many things in multiple dimensions, but benchmarks were easily gamed.

bombcar3 days ago
You can have it without benchmarks that can be gamed, but then it's basically down to "this feels right" and you have to trust the leadership to not be discriminatory, etc.
sokoloff3 days ago
I think an awful lot of people would rather receive their livelihood without being subject to measurement.
Forgeties793 days ago
I didn’t say no measurements at all. I was very specific with my language
pstuart3 days ago
Goodhart's Law strikes again.
azan_4 days ago
How should they be judged then? Any metric can be gamed. And if it will be kind of qualitative assessment then politics will be 10000x more important. The system is clearly broken but I’m not sure if alternative is not even worse.
shae4 days ago
After decades of dealing with Elsevier, Springer-Verlag and the rest; I hope they all go out of business.
kspacewalk24 days ago
The funny thing is, if the guy wasn't quite so greedy with this racket, probably no one would notice. Surely if the number of your publications and citations shoots up exponentially and surpasses those of much more well-known scientists, folks are bound to ask questions. I wonder if this got out of control or whether he really did think it's a good idea to collude his way to such prominence.
themafia4 days ago
> probably no one would notice.

It probably wouldn't have risen to this level. People always notice but don't always react in ways you can measure.

tedggh4 days ago
This is typical behavior from psychopaths when they get away with the crime for so long, they believe they are untouchable and start becoming sloppy and get caught.
ChrisMarshallNY4 days ago
I am not arguing against the facts expressed in the piece. This is not an area in which I have any expertise.

However, I am a bit uncomfortable with the pithy language used. It's possible (likely, even), that the fired editors deserve the pithiness, but it's still a bit weird to read that kind of prose, in a scientific context.

mklyachman4 days ago
This is an investigative substack, not a piece of academic literature. God forbid the author home some (admittedly, strong) opinions and speaks negatively about fraudsters.
JMKH424 days ago
I am amazed that every time evil is exposed there are people who have to jump in and wonder "Are we being a bit too mean to the evil though?"

Makes me wonder if these people are just evil themselves.

mananaysiempre4 days ago
There are few things I’m afraid of more than a man that thinks himself righteous, because there is very little that such a man would be unwilling to do.

So it makes sense to be cautious when I find myself feeling like one, or being pulled along by the emotions of another who does.

idle_zealot4 days ago
You're not wrong about the danger posed, but take a step back and consider who this attitude helps. The greatest beneficiaries of a culture in which good faith and civility are unconditionally granted for fear of misguided righteous anger is a paradise for fraudsters and bad faith actors. I think we're seeing that world now.
blueflow4 days ago
It comes from having the sort of parents whose behavior warrants this kind of suspicions.
pessimizer4 days ago
I've decided that it's a weird reversed counterpart to "impostor syndrome" (when you secretly think you're not that good while trying your best to maintain a professional standard.)

I think there's this sort of "moral impostor syndrome" where people who carefully work to present an image of themselves as good people are totally willing to participate in fraud or theft at any level - the only consideration is whether they will be caught, because they value the appearance of being good people (and of course, that appearance gives them more opportunities to commit fraud and theft safely.) If they want to do something and there's no way they'll be caught, they'll do it 100% of the time.

This is the only way I can understand people who refer to fraud as a "mistake." They see other people caught in a fraud that they can imagine that they themselves might have done, because they also wouldn't have thought that they would have ever been caught. The "mistake" was evaluating the chances of the success of a fraud badly.

The fact that they relate to these people also makes them want to give them a second chance, just as they would want to be able to recover their careers if any of their past (or future) frauds had become "mistakes."

"There but for the grace of God go I."

It's terrible. It incentivizes evil. The desperation to give people a second chance to expiate one's own secret sins by proxy creates a system where people only initially draw attention through frauds, then get caught, then get second chances. Meanwhile, people who didn't participate in fraud never get noticed. It's a perverse incentive that filters for trash. Do anything to get your name out there, then the fact that your name is out there gets you into the conversation.

Meanwhile, somebody is scolding you for being upset about it: "You're just perfect I guess. Never made a mistake." Fraud is not a mistake. You do it on purpose.

_will_4 days ago
Maybe I'm just naive or dense, but I'm not seeing language I'd be concerned about in the article? Help me get calibrated, is there something in particular that bothers you? or just a general vibe?
fancyfredbot4 days ago
I thought the caption "looking normal" was possibly a bit unnecessary.

Then again, I also found it rather funny. I suspect this is because I am a bad person.

ChrisMarshallNY4 days ago
Well...the reactions were ... enlightening

I certainly apologize for hurting feelings. That was not my intent.

I've just learned (the hard way, of course, because how else do we learn?), that using this kind of terminology, even though we may be feeling quite pithy, gives ammo to those that wish to discount us.

This goes double, in my experience, for any context that prizes objectivity and articulate discussion.

amarcheschi4 days ago
It'd be nice to check whether some llms still have "memory" of the paper she has deleted
recursive4 days ago
That's the neat part. You can never know for sure.
amarcheschi3 days ago
No but maybe if you get the correct name extracted by an llm and search it online you'll get cached sites, or links showing that they actually exist
mlmonkey4 days ago
It will be interesting to see how Goodell's citations drop going forward.
bpt34 days ago
3 down, thousands to go.

This will continue until Elsevier and their 3 or 4 peers are removed from the academic publishing process entirely.

cess114 days ago
Elsevier has a history of 'promoting' successful millers to more or other journals, so they can 'drive growth', as it's sometimes put in IT, there as well.

https://forbetterscience.com/2023/10/24/elsevier-choses-pape...

This type of corporation is nasty and should not be allowed to exist, but thanks to people like the Maxwell clan, they do. For now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnmFTvlrsOo

fewgrehrehre4 days ago
A fun and interesting article!

I must however, take the time to be the ever-sensitive snowflake and highlight a troubling trend in this person's other posts. He seems to have some anti-trans leanings[1], refusing to gender people correctly and all that (and certainly not pushing back against comments which declare "M to Fs are psychotic bullies who would kill all of us to maintain their sacred illusion". Not to imply that one must rebuke every unkind thing in their comment section, but I hope you can understand that it is illustrative of his audience.). Now I'm no proponent of death threats or double standards, it's just a convenient way to highlight a lack of respect. He will misgender you if he does not like you, and he does not like any delusional transwomen[2].

He's also quite concerned about Canada's population. The capital-W White population specifically [3]. Note that this is presented separate from later graphs about TFWs, so I don't even think he has the right to hide behind that paper-tissue-thin shield. He is quite sad to see the Great White North get a little less white. I am not saying that Canada has managed its immigration well, but I do not believe that he is overly concerned with those matters.

I'm not here to litigate his arguments, I have other things to do with my life. He has his principles, and I have mine. I'm certain he'd be happy to talk for hours about the transwomen and the Indians and all the topics polite society cowers from. His anti-Zionism and dislike of the Rothchilds, I am certain, comes from a strongly-voiced anti-Imperalist lense.

[1] https://www.chrisbrunet.com/p/this-phd-student-at-brown-univ...

[2] https://substack.com/@chrisbrunet/note/c-244102564

[3] https://www.chrisbrunet.com/i/175390557/6-white-population

kspacewalk24 days ago
I'm torn about your comment. On the one hand, the context is interesting. On the other hand, it's almost unrelated to the substance of this post of his. I suppose there's a general anti-mainstream-science bias propagating through national-conservative/far-right/alt-right circles, specifically about how the world of academia functions. However, the facts of this post about how a corner of academia functions ought to stand up or fall down independently of all that. 95-100% of this is facts (falsifiable, and maybe wrong, but stated as such), and a tiny percentage is opinion.
fewgrehrehre4 days ago
Oh yeah, it's a fine post! Interesting read. But I don't think it's that silly to say that success for a person who espouses these views is success for the views themselves, and that a tone-shift might arise if gradually, more and more posts about inoffensive topics written by "Mr. Don't Worry About It ;)" make their way onto the front page.
mold_aid3 days ago
I don't think it's strange at all to see this post, and the argument, in the context of Brunet's general antagonism towards academe. Certainly suggests that some arguments might be made in bad faith, or as performative gravy-train applications for the broader conservative news ecosystem.
Pay084 days ago
To be honest, the skepticism around non-STEM fields is completely deserved. It's a complete shithole.
ArbriT4 days ago
Is it just me or this makes me feel less guilty for using libgen all these years
munk-a4 days ago
Information for non-commercial purposes should be free for general social enrichment. Information for commercial purposes should have some path towards monetization but the one we've got right now is clearly a terrible fit.

For the future, though, usually if you just email one of the paper author's with even a hint of interest you'll get the full paper and often a neat discussion about how your specific interest relates to the paper. I think people assume researchers get hounded by fans like celebrities but they're usually folks that love to talk about their topics of interest.

fc417fc8022 days ago
Why should taxpayer funded research be monetized when used for commercial purposes? We have a privatized publication cartel monetizing a public good. We should instead nationalize the publishers.
jamesfinlayson3 days ago
Agreed - I emailed some people about a paper recently - they no longer had some supporting stuff that I was interested in but they were very helpful all the same.
embedding-shape4 days ago
I don't know anyone who should be feeling guilty from using libgen in the first place.
azan_4 days ago
I feel guilty for publishing in elsevier and paying for their “services”. By all means using scihub and libgen is morally superior position.
JMKH424 days ago
I am amazed that every time evil is exposed there are people who have to jump in and wonder "Are we being a bit too mean to the evil though?"

Makes me wonder if these people are just evil themselves.

mananaysiempre4 days ago
There are few things I’m afraid of more than a man that thinks himself righteous, because there is very little that such a man would be unwilling to do.

So it makes sense to be cautious when I find myself feeling like one, or being pulled along by the emotions of another who does.

idle_zealot4 days ago
You're not wrong about the danger posed, but take a step back and consider who this attitude helps. The greatest beneficiaries of a culture in which good faith and civility are unconditionally granted for fear of misguided righteous anger is a paradise for fraudsters and bad faith actors. I think we're seeing that world now.
mattw21214 days ago
Spot on. Leaders in my company love to tout the line "assume good faith". If you say anything that indicates someone else is not operating in good faith, you are deemed the bad actor. This allows bad actors to run absolutely rampant.
mmooss3 days ago
> consider who this attitude helps

It helps the good people, who do good and influence their society to do the same, and live in a good society. The best societies give the accused the full protection of the law, and give them fair trials. The problematic ones have mob rule.

Much of what you write assumes the OP author and you know what evil is, with certainty. That is the critical and most dangerous flaw.

trinsic24 days ago
This is a good point. I tend to be careful not to fall into this trap myself, but it doesn't really do any good to call it out in public. it ends up empowering the bad actors. Thank you for this awareness.
blueflow4 days ago
It comes from having the sort of parents whose behavior warrants this kind of suspicions.
pessimizer4 days ago
I've decided that it's a weird reversed counterpart to "impostor syndrome" (when you secretly think you're not that good while trying your best to maintain a professional standard.)

I think there's this sort of "moral impostor syndrome" where people who carefully work to present an image of themselves as good people are totally willing to participate in fraud or theft at any level - the only consideration is whether they will be caught, because they value the appearance of being good people (and of course, that appearance gives them more opportunities to commit fraud and theft safely.) If they want to do something and there's no way they'll be caught, they'll do it 100% of the time.

This is the only way I can understand people who refer to fraud as a "mistake." They see other people caught in a fraud that they can imagine that they themselves might have done, because they also wouldn't have thought that they would have ever been caught. The "mistake" was evaluating the chances of the success of a fraud badly.

The fact that they relate to these people also makes them want to give them a second chance, just as they would want to be able to recover their careers if any of their past (or future) frauds had become "mistakes."

"There but for the grace of God go I."

It's terrible. It incentivizes evil. The desperation to give people a second chance to expiate one's own secret sins by proxy creates a system where people only initially draw attention through frauds, then get caught, then get second chances. Meanwhile, people who didn't participate in fraud never get noticed. It's a perverse incentive that filters for trash. Do anything to get your name out there, then the fact that your name is out there gets you into the conversation.

Meanwhile, somebody is scolding you for being upset about it: "You're just perfect I guess. Never made a mistake." Fraud is not a mistake. You do it on purpose.

Advertisement
blizdiddy4 days ago
Makes sense. Economics isn’t science, it’s numerology that justifies exploiting workers.
azan_4 days ago
Your comment is funny because it’s completely opposite - economics has generally great track record and fraudulent results typically do not survive for long. Citation cartels and paper mills exist in all disciplines.
lazyasciiart3 days ago
Behavioral economics is challenging this - see the fake data published in a 2012 Ariely paper and identified in 2021.
dkga3 days ago
Not "behavioural economics", but rather a very small number of rotten apples.
greenchair4 days ago
the economists have a terrible record which is why public opinion of them is low. I'd guess equal weight to meterologists forecasting.
LeifCarrotson4 days ago
Do meteorologists have a terrible record?

I've literally got the NWS hourly forecast and radar open in the next tab over to watch when and where the rain will be clear as I plan my route home...

cess114 days ago
Does it, really? There haven't been any problematic issues since economists and their lore became a dominant influence over politics that could be attributed to this influence?