To what extent do monetary incentives encourages researchers to publish in ISI Journals? There is an argument in my institute that ISI journal publication incentive (in ISI journals only) should be omitted. However, the opposition, including me, believe that such monetary incentive would motivate young researchers who are low paid researchers to publish their work in ISI journals. I checked some of the international universities and found similar discussions tend to agree that incentive is necessary for young publishers and researchers.

What is the status in your institutes and to what extent do you think payment for ISI journal publication encourages researchers to work more seriously?

NOTEs:
1- Please consider that the focus is on legitimate peer reviewed ISI journal publication ONLY, not any other publications such as conference or predatory open access journals.

2- FYI, in Computer Science, publishing in a legitimate peer reviewed ISI journal takes from 6 months to 2 years. If a novice researcher can publish in 6 months, he/she is considered very lucky and brilliant.

What is the status in your institutes and to what extent do you think payment for publication encourage researchers to work more seriously?

I've never worked in an environment with payment for publication, so my impressions are based on observing it from the outside.  I'm sure it encourages publishing more papers, but publishing more papers is different from working more seriously:

Publication payments encourage mediocre submissions, since success is defined by having a paper in a certain type of journal, regardless of how good or bad the paper is.  In many cases the optimal strategy is not to work hard on writing a few excellent papers, but rather to write as many mediocre papers as possible and then submit them repeatedly in a search for lenient editors and reviewers.
In addition to the quality issue, payments per paper create an incentive to break work up into least publishable units.
Publication payments complicate coauthorship decisions, based on how the money is awarded.  If every coauthor receives a fixed amount, then it creates a financial incentive to add honorary authors.  On the other hand, if a fixed amount of money is divided among all the authors, then it creates an incentive to remove less important but legitimate authors.  (And if it's just the "first author," then that magnifies the importance of who that author is.)  Either way, authorship is being decided based partly on financial pressure, rather than intellectual contributions.

Of course, all these issues are already serious problems in academia, with or without publication payments, but adding direct financial incentives just makes them worse.  In addition, using a fixed formula heightens the tension by removing ambiguity.  With hiring, one might worry that hiring committees will count papers instead of judging their quality, but at least some of them will prefer two great papers to five mediocre ones.  By contrast, the incentives with publication payments are unambiguous, which strengthens their effects.


My professor has told me he will be the corresponding author. Will it hurt my future career? I recently got acceptance in an SCI journal, and my professor has told me that he will be a corresponding author (CA) even though I have done almost all the work.

Does not being the corresponding author hurt my chances, as I am looking to start an academic career very soon. Should I ask my professor to be the CA instead?

My professor is a real nice guy and has taught me a lot, but I am concerned in this case. Any suggestions?

Edit: My field is Electrical Engineering and Computer Networks specifically.

First, take time to read this question to understand what does the Corresponding Author mean for different publishers. The definitions vary, but in principle CA is the author who can be contacted about the paper results after the publication, including the long-term period (10+ years). Perhaps, you are the best person to act as a CA for this paper? Do ask yourself the following questions:

How certain is that you will be working in academia in the next 1 year? 3 years? 5 years? 10 years? What about your Professor?
If you provide your current contact details (address, email) as a CA, how likely is that your correspondence will reach you at this address in 1 year? 3 years? 5 years? 10 years? What about your Professor?
A CA may receive some specific questions about the study, but also broader questions about possible ways how it can be changed, adapted for a new problem, applied to a particular area in another discipline. There may be questions on how the methods used in the study compare to what other groups were doing or are planning to do. Are you fully prepared to answer these questions? What about your Professor?

If based on the answers, you decide that you are the best person to act as a CA, simply initiate a discussion with your Professor, using your answers as key points of your proposal.


How to deal with repeated resubmissions of a bad paper (as a reviewer)? (Context: theoretical computer science.)

I just received a review request; I have previously reviewed three previous versions of the same submission (twice for conferences, once for a journal), recommending rejection each time.  For one of the conferences, there was discussion between reviewers and PC members; all reviewers agreed that the paper was “strong reject”.

Between each iteration, the paper has been lightly revised, but never addressing two fundamental problems: the novel content is very insubstantial, and the write-up contains substantial self-plagiarism.

The author(s) have/has extensive publication records, containing some genuinely significant work, but also a very large amount of repetition, often to the extent of self-plagiarism.

My current response is: accept to do the review (first letting the editor know that I have reviewed earlier versions and recommended rejection); then see what significant changes have been made, and if the major problems haven't been addressed, re-reject with essentially the same criticisms as before.

A generous referee might reasonably judge the work substantial enough for a third-tier conference, and not notice the self-plagiarism; so I guess the paper will probably strike it lucky and get published sooner or later.  Is there anything else I can or should be doing to forestall this?  Or should I accept that bad papers do get published, and that the damage the authors are causing to their reputation with referees/editors along the way is enough censure?

This type of repeated submission of junk is something that I truly hate, but also don't know any good way of dealing with.  The problem is that the same freedom that supports novel science also leaves room for this type of "publication-shopping."  In essence: any more unified method of "disapproving" junk papers, to prevent them from wasting everybody's time, will also work against highly novel papers that are meeting resistance from entrenched communities---see, for example, the decades-long fight Barbara McClintock faced in getting her work on gene regulation accepted.

We are thus left with the current and default system, in which each publication judges independently, and in which reviewers face frustrating situations like the one you describe.  My recommendation, then, is simply to judge the paper on its merits, of which it has little.  The biggest key strike is the self-plagiarism: once you've discovered that, the rest doesn't really matter, because self-plagiarism is an offense worth rejecting a paper over in and of itself.

I would recommend informing the editor, along with informing the editor about the history of the paper.  They may then either judge whether to speedily reject the paper (and possibly initiate proceedings against the authors for the self-plagiarism), or whether to ask you to formally write this assessment as a review.


Print Phd thesis in A4 or A5? I would like to ask those in Academia who supervise PhD students and get to read their Phd theses. When checking on previous theses submitted to the library, I found some printed not in the more common A4, but A5 format, half the size of A4.

I was wondering whether is is more comfortable for supervisors to read a thesis of roughly 200 pages (just counting the main matter) in A4 or A5 format? My thesis would contain some "normal-sized" tables and figures.

Firstly, just checking the library is not enough — there might be restrictions on the format and only the relevant office can tell you what those restrictions are (if any).

Secondly, if you find out that you do have a choice (between A4 and A5 paper, for example), the natural thing to do would be to ask would be your supervisor in what format they would like to read your thesis.

(After submitting several printed copies of the thesis for review, you may get some of them back after your thesis defence, which you can submit to the library.)


How to Refer to Enumerated Subsections and Subsubsections? Body

There is Subsection 1.2.
There is Subsubsection 1.4.1.

Referring in the body now

See Subsection 1.2.
See Subsubsection 1.4.1.

I would like to replace all sub parts simply by section etc the following but not sure if correct

See Section 1.2.
See Section 1.4.1.

You should eliminate "sub" from the labels.  It is easier to understand and easier to update when the sections change.


How often academic inventions have already been invented in private companies? Is there any research/study/survey that looked at how often academic inventions have already been in private companies (or public but secretive organizations, e.g. the RSA cryptosystem was first discovered UK intelligence agency GCHQ)?

I am most interested in the field of computer science.

I expect that such a study cannot, in fact, be effectively done.

The reason is that academic re-invention of a closely held secret will be virtually impossible to reliably document except in particular anecdotal high-profile cases, such as RSA.

Most secret information probably does not become public at all: I suspect that most obsolete trade secrets in companies eventually simply end up in the trash or shredder, because why would anybody bother doing anything else?
For any secret that does become publicly available, there generally will be a long delay before that occurs.  At that point, the relationship between two independently invented decades-old technologies will be difficult to detect by anybody not specifically motivated, since they likely would have very different terminology and specifics.

As such, I would expect that it is impossible to do any general study on the frequency with which academic research is a re-invention of secret work elsewhere.


Impact of the visit weekend weather on the admitted graduates' grad school decision in the US US universities typically organize visit weekends for newly admitted graduates, after which the latter confirm or refuse the offer. Is there any research/study/survey that looked at the impact of the visit weekend weather on the admitted graduates' grad school decision?

The short non-scientific answer: YES

My answer is just based on anecdotes and I am not aware of any methodological research on this subject (it is not my field of research). I've listened to an episode of This American Life about this subject, in which they interview professors on the admission committees of different universities. According the the interviews, visiting a university is a good indication that the student is interested in the school and is more likely to attend the school if he/she is admitted.

This is episode "504: How I Got Into College" of the podcast, which you can find here (http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college).

P.S. I tried to post this as a comment to the question but it was too long. I apologize if this is not the answer you are looking for.


Is it OK to change my research tools/methods completely after/at the end of my PhD? In my Phd, I was using tools of stochastic geometry for my research. But I realize now that the juice has mostly been drawn of this tool at this stage and the new kid around the block is now Game theory, Machine learning (ML), and AI in my field.

I don't have any idea of ML at this stage, but while I am writing my thesis, I am now taking an online course for it. I just want to ask if it is OK to change my tools of research after I have done my PhD with another tool, and if I apply for a post-doc position, how will my recruiters judge me.

Undoubtedly, to me, the answer is yes. I am free to learn whatever I want, whenever I want, and do the research I want, as long as it is following right scientific methods. I may even think of multidisciplinary research where I can learn other disciplines and integrate them in my research. Science is all about curiosity and continuous learning and exploring.


Correct practice for representing units in figure and text? What is best practice (if any exist) for representing units of a quantity in figures and text for publications.

I have seen use of both () and [] for representing units, eg. in a plot if y axis represents velocity then v(m/s) and v[m/s].

I would like to know what correct: parentheses OR square bracket Or something else?

The publication likely has a style guide. Failing that, just flip through a few published papers until you find an example, then use that


How can I best determine if a masters program is of high quality? I'm about to start my master in mathematics next year. I'm having a lot of trouble determining how some of the options available to me compare. They are all not very wel known programs, and I don't think it's a good idea to name them here explicitly so I won't.

This whole choice is really stressing me out a bit. I want to choose the best one, but I have no idea how best to compare them. Things that I'm currently taking into consideration:

The number of enrolled students. This varies from only 10 to around 35 per year. 10 seems very low to me. And remember we're not talking about very prestigious programs here.
The structure of the program. Some programs make you choose a track in which you specialize, while others don't. You can of course still build that specialisation into your program on your own, but I feel that this explicit specialisation is probably better. I also think that better profs are attracted to programs where they can teach just their specialisation.

I would appreciate some input on the relevance of those two factors, as well as other things I should consider and ways of approaching this.

I will be studying pure mathematics and hope to be able to stay in acedemia if that is relevant for this situation.

There are several things you could try

Read student reviews online - sites like GradCafe offer
interesting discussions that will give you an idea how well the programs are run and how much faculty members are willing to go the extra mile to help their students get jobs after they graduate.
Look at USNews ranking as a loose reference. In my opinion (as a mathematician) those rankings do not fully reflect how good an institution is, but a department ranked #1 is quite likely to be better than one ranked #100. Bear in mind that US News won't give you the full picture, though, you could run into a fantastic professor at an institution that only gets a decent ranking.
Speak to the academic advisor in your department

Last but not least, your choice very much depends if you want to stay in the academia. If you're going into industry, reputation and the alumni network might be factors to consider. Otherwise, browse through the faculty directories and see if there's any potential match of research interests. For example, if you want to learn analysis, you're better off going to UCLA than to Harvard.

Good luck!


Do you spell out Thm., Prop., Eq., Ch. in mathematical papers? Just as the title says: do you spell out Thm., Prop., Eq., Ch. and comparable abbreviations in a mathematical paper?

I suppose that, if in doubt, it is always best to stay consistent (in whatever way) throughout ones writing for the least. Do journals have (different) policies on this, or is there a prefered style when in doubt?

It is a matter of style. I would say yes, expand them. In my opinion, authors tend to over-abbreviate making documents harder to read. For instance, I can't work out what you mean by Ch. (Conjechure?)


Paper A that cited Paper B is found via GoogleScholar, yet the citation is not counted for Paper B. Why? As stated in the subject, Paper A that cited Paper B is found via GoogleScholar (as is paper B), yet the citation is not counted for Paper B. Can anybody offer some insight into how this can happen or why?
Note that the paper B was properly cited by paper A, via a citation export on one of the popular services.

Is this common? I thank you in advance.

To determine that A cites B, Google Scholar parses the citation list at the end of paper A. There are a number of things that could go wrong there: bad OCR, use of ligatures in Latex, confusion between papers with the same title, a "references" section that Google does not identify as such...


How to handle lecturer who doesn't let me use my phone? Inspired by another question where a user asks how to handle students with a phone, my question is from the opposite perspective: what is the correct response when a lecturer asks one to put away the phone?

This actually recently happened to me (a few months ago), and for obvious reasons (not wanting to interrupt the flow of the lecture, not wanting to have a falling out with the professor, etc), I just put my phone down.

But to be honest, I don't think that's the correct response, or at least I feel this is not the way it should be, because I find such demands inappropriate for a number of reasons, and so I shouldn't be giving in to them, should I?

My reasoning:

First of all, and this may sound immature, but what I do with my phone is none of the lecturer's business. As long as I am not disturbing anybody (audio is always off, I am never typing loudly because it's a touch-screen, and nobody is distracted by the screen because I make sure to sit in the back), it shouldn't be a problem.

Secondly, I find that such demands can impede my learning. I often use the phone to look up information related to what the lecturer is actually talking about. If a topic is mentioned that I don't quite recall, a quick google search or a 10-second glance at the topic's Wikipedia page brings me up to speed. Or perhaps the textbook for the course is on my cloud server and I need to the phone to actually access the book, if I didn't bring (or even buy) the physical copy.

Finally, I find it highly disrespectful to call a student out for being on a phone in the middle of a lecture in front of all others. Such conversations, if they need to be had, should be had in private. Approach me after the lecture or during the break if you have a problem. Don't call me out in front of the entire class.

this may sound immature

And it is.

You're acting as if you have the right to do what you want.  You don't!

It's a teaching session in a building owned and run by other people and they set the rules and delegate the authority.

You have two legitimate choices (1) obey the rules and the authority or (2) leave.

If you want to protest the rule, contact your student union (a legitimate channel for complaints).  You can pass your opinion along that way.  However the decision still rests with the people in authority, and ultimately you will have to accept that fact.

Note also that the people making that decision are both experienced teachers and students themselves.  You are not.  Respect their experience.

There's one more important reason:

You are there to learn.  You should be paying attention and listening.  You may need to ask questions and you may miss something if you don't.

I watch a driving show where bad drivers are educated and it's astonishing to see how many of the bad drivers put forward all sorts of elaborate rationalizations for using a phone when driving.  People are, simply, addicted to their phones.  Learn to do without it.  If you can't sit through a lecture without your phone, it bodes ill for when you hit the real world.

Note then if you were my employee and you started looking at your phone when I was presenting a report in a meeting, you'd be on your way to being fired.

The right you think you have to use a phone when you want does not exist.

Respect the rules other people set when using their resources.

It's that simple.

  Finally, I find it highly disrespectful to call a student out for being on a phone in the middle of a lecture in front of all others

You are now experiencing the real world.  The one where people call you out to your face and in public for your errors.

Get used to it.  It's the difference between an adult and child.  All part of learning.

How disrespectful were you being by ignoring the teacher?   Did you think about that?

Immature is the right word.

Edit : regarding this and similar comments :

There are too many comments to address individually and this is as much effort as I'm willing to spend on this relatively small storm in a teacup.  My gut feeling is this won't make people who oppose my viewpoint any happier, but they deserve some kind of response.  But life's too short, so this is probably all I'll be doing on the subject.

Remember : Agree to Disagree is not ideal, but it's practical. :-)

  One thing which could improve this answer is an acknowledgement that the OP is paying the institution for certain services and - unless he disturbs others - it's not the institution owning his time and not their place to order him around. The OP is not working for the professor, the professor is working for him.

That's not how it works ( in the real world :-) ).

The fantasy that "the professor is working for him" is not correct.  What is happening is that for a fee you are permitted access to the resources (including lectures) of the college/school.  But that's not a one way contract - you are accepting the authority of the college/school and it's agents and their rules.  Typically that small print gives the lecturer rather a lot more power and discretion than you realize.

If the rules are really unreasonable (e.g. pretty girls/guys in front, stand all the time when there are seats, etc.) then you have two choices : dispute them in some legal way (e.g. contact the authorities or ultimately take legal action) or leave.

Now one of the most basic rules is that you pay attention.  It's not complicated.  It's nor strange.  It's not an infringement on your human rights.  It's an implicit (possibly explicit) part of your contract with the school.  It's the only thing you are required to do at a lecture beyond those other common sense things of not disturbing other people, dressing, not eating, not drinking, not talking - and so on..

And, yes, it can disturb other people when you start using your phone to text or whatever.

  OP just said they did put the phone down when the teacher asked

That's nice but the issue is the fact they should not have been using the phone in the first place.  The OP doesn't get this or the question would not have been asked here.

I've explained the OP needs to contact the authorities via appropriate channels.  That's all there is to it.

Many people seem upset by my post.  Fine.  They have a right to be upset if that's how they feel.  If it's any consolation when I was a young student I also thought every rule, restriction and law was personally aimed at suppressing my rights.  Maturity (experience) teaches you that it's not that black and white.  Some rules are necessary.

Inconvenience is not the same as being deprived of a right.

I am happy to encourage people who disagree to say so, but if you want change remember three things :

I can't change things.  You need to exercise normal legal political activity to try and get changes you want.  In normal political activity you do not always get what you want.  So contact your student unions, get a petition going, make a logical case to the authorities.  But be prepared to not win, because that happens.  Never start a battle you are not prepared to lose.
You can get more with a carrot and stick than you can with a stick.  Make a logical case why using a phone would benefit the college and lecturer as well as the student and you'll get a lot further than talking about rights you don't actually have.  That kind of approach will sound very naive to the authorities.
There are better battles for your energies that the right to fiddle with your phone during lectures.  Put that youthful vigor into something more useful to the rest of the world, please.


Citing a result due to a single author that appears in a paper with multiple authors Let's say that Jones and Smith publish a mathematical paper containing a result (Theorem 3.1, say,) which is said in that paper to be due to Smith alone but appears for the first time in her joint paper with Jones.  How should I cite this result?

Here are a few examples of ways I might cite the result if Jones were not a co-author of the paper (for definiteness let's say the paper is number 7 in my bibliography):

"By a theorem of Smith [7, Theorem 3.1]..."
"Our argument is based on that of Smith [7, Theorem 3.1]..."
"...implies the hypothesis of Smith's theorem [7, Theorem 3.1]..."

How might I adapt these phrasings to the situation described above?

I would just cite it as "Jones and Smith" and not worry about it.  The standard in math is to cite papers by their authors.  If Smith wanted to be cited alone, she should have published the result herself.

I think this situation has some precedent in other fields.  I might be wrong, but think some journals such as Nature (see http://www.nature.com/nature/authors/gta/#a5.5 "author contributions") make the authors disclose who did what.  It does not mean that the paper needs to be cited differently depending on what part of it is used.


Effective reviewing in top tier Computer Science conferences Most top conferences in Computer Science receive a record number of submissions every year, like AAAI received almost 9000 submissions this year, while CVPR 2020 received 6600 submissions. That would mean atleast 27000 and 20000 reviews respectively. That would mean almost 5000 and 4000 reviewers respectively, assuming 5 papers per reviewer.

I've also come across a few posts of area chairs (of these top-tier conferences) expressing their frustration of not getting reviews from the reviewers in time, and as a result there is a compromise on the quality of reviews. Is the burgeoning rise in ML/AI leading to falling standards? Is there an effective solution to this? Do such conferences have a way to check the quality of reviewers given that a lot of them are PhD students?

One criteria mentioned on their sites is that the reviewer should have 1-2 publications in such top-tier conferences, but is that enough? For instance, I have 3-4 publications (not in highly ranked conferences/journals), but I don't think I can provide effective reviews for papers submitted to those particular conferences/journals. Is there some additional criteria as well?

Anecdotal evidence: IEEE ICDM used to demand that all reviewers hold doctor titles, so there were no PhD students in the Program Committee. Then, in one particular year, all PC members were asked to review 17 papers (instead of the promised, and usual at ICDM, batch size of 8-10 papers), in a reviewing period of 16 days (including weekends). That did not lead to high-quality reviews either, and as additional fallout damage, several PC members declined the invitation for next year's ICDM, amplifying the problem.

I am not aware of any reasonable solution from the point of view of conference organizers:

If we put criteria on reviewers, then fewer reviewers will be available, so the available reviewers must each do more work, which reduces their availability for other conferences.
IJCAI this year asked their area chairs to rather aggressively desk reject papers: about half of all papers were filtered out before reviewing even begun. This decreases the load on PC members, but increases the load on area chairs, and it will inevitably increase the already unacceptably high variance inherent in the reviewing process: not all desk rejected papers will have deserved to be desk rejected, which is very unfair on those authors.
ICLR does open reviewing, which means that reviews and reviewer identities are published on the internet. Since people know that their name will be available along with the review they wrote, only those people that know that they can invest a substantial amount of time will accept a reviewing invitation. This means that the reviewer pool will be smaller, which increases the load on individual PC members...
If a conference were to monitor the performance of reviewers, and would somehow* manage to evaluate the quality of the reviews, then what? Suppose that PC members do a bad job. Do you kick them out? Then we have even fewer PC members to complete the job next year, increasing the load on the other PC members...

*how would we do this, though? Should the area chairs assess this? That would massively increase the workload of area chairs, which is probably not a good idea given the overload problems the rest of this post outlines.

As a scientist who tries to publish papers, I see two solutions on how to deal with the problem:

Grow a thick skin when receiving conference reviews and trust that in the long run, the bias towards good papers will outweigh the variance in individual conference decisions.
Submit your paper to a journal instead; if your papers gets an unjust bad review for a journal, you can at least discuss with the editor.


What to do when another researcher used my results without credit in a science documentary? A former colleague (not collaborator) used main results of two of my published papers in a science documentary featuring their work. They had briefly mention to me at some point, that they wanted to use my work, including images from the paper to help explain their work. Of course, I said it would be fine, as long as they would contact the senior author of the work (images are copyrighted) and cited the authors/project name. This researcher never contacted the senior author and in the documentary there is no credit to any of the studies, not during the doc nor in the final credits. Also, the person never even mentions it is not their own work, so it makes it seem they did the work themselves. I would already be happy with something along the lines of "previous research has shown". But not one word indicates the work is not theirs.

I want to take action about this, but not sure what to do. I am no longer in the University where I published both papers, nor in the University where we were both colleagues. I emailed the senior author already and I am awaiting reply. But I want to take further action as the documentary just aired a couple of days ago.

Would it be advisable to contact the makers of the documentary (it's a big US TV network)?
Should I contact the University where this researcher is now working at? (The University name appears in the documentary as the person's affiliation)
Should I approach them directly by email? What should I say?
What would be the appropriate steps to take?

I want to take action, but don't want to get myself in legal issues either... so any advice is appreciated!

Update: One of my former advisors (not involved in any of the studies) strongly encouraged me to let it slide arguing that published information can be used by anyone in documentaries aimed to the lay public. And that documentaries cannot cite everyone involved in the research, as this is not interesting to the public. I am surprised this is their position. Does anyone else thinks this is the correct way to think about it?

I agree with your former advisor: let it slide...published information can be used by anyone in documentaries...[they] cannot cite everyone, perhaps even anyone, as this is not interesting, moreover, it's distracting. This applies not only to documentaries, but most manuscripts outside of academic publishing, e.g., textbooks, company reports, magazine articles, ... (That said, authors should ideally be able to produce sources.) Bask in the glory of having your work included, mention the media coverage on your CV, on your web page, in future research papers, etc.


How to inform an emotionally abusive advisor I don't want to work with him? I am an incoming PhD student.  Before I applied, I chose a particular school because it had a specific PI.  (Of course, this is not a good idea, but I did not know better at the time.)  The PI is very famous in my field and was extremely excited about having me in his lab, going above and beyond to get me to work in his lab (e.g. private tours, etc.).  I believe he was partially responsible for getting me into this school, but I can never be certain.

I had to take a year off for medical reasons, but for the last year and a half, we have been in monthly discussions about what I will work on and what I will do, and he has been giving me lots of work to do before I arrive.  Up until just recently, it was obvious to both of us that when I came to the school I would be in his lab.  He expects me to skip my lab rotations and join his lab immediately.

However, I recently learned from a conversation with one of his postdocs that he has being emotionally abusive to one of his graduate students (e.g. comments along the lines of "you know everybody hates you").  I also learned that he has been completely ignoring one of his postdocs (as a result of which the postdoc hasn't published in the last year and a half), and that he gave away the project of his other graduate student to someone not in the lab, and then lied about it.

So obviously I'm not joining this lab.  What is the best way to break off this relationship?  I am concerned about him retaliating, as he has a lot of power in the department.  I also cannot share my true reasons for leaving with him, because then he would retaliate against the postdoc who told me.

Is this something that should be done via email?  Skype?  I saw him recently when I visited the school (and learned this information) so I did not bring it up then.  There are many other labs in the department so I'm not concerned about that.  But I am concerned about what the consequences might be for leaving his lab.  Also, what kind of excuse should I use?  My present excuse is "I am questioning my interest in sub-sub-subfield X and want to do rotations before I start working with you."

My answer assumes that you are convinced that your presumptive advisor is emotionally abusive, and that you have made a firm decision not to work with him.

However, you haven't given a first- or even second-hand account of abuse or neglect; it's also possible that the postdoc is blowing a personality conflict out of proportion by spreading false accusations.  The only direct red flag I see is your presumptive advisor's expectation that you will join his lab directly without doing rotations.  You may want to have a confidential discussion with another senior faculty member about your concerns, before jumping off this particular cliff.

Pretend that your presumptive advisor is a reasonable adult human being.  Talk to them in person.  Be straightforward and honest.

  "Thank you for your encouragement and your support, but I have decided not to join your lab."

That's it.  You do not owe them an excuse, an explanation, an apology, or a description of your alternate plans.  (I think you do owe them thanks.)

If you would be more comfortable giving an explanation, then do so respectfully, honestly, and carefully.  But if you have no intention of working with this advisor in the future, do not suggest the opposite, even indirectly.  In particular, you should not say "I want to do rotations before joining your lab" unless you actually intend to join their lab after doing rotations.  It would be better to say something like

  "I have decided to do full rotations before joining any particular lab.  I want to explore a few different subareas, and I think the breadth of experience will help my long-term academic career."

Be ready for the advisor to pressure you to do a rotation in their lab, or to argue that you're actually damaging your long-term career by not joining a lab directly.  Thank him again for his advice and encouragement, but stick to your guns.  Or he might surprise you by being completely supportive and giving you good advice about other labs to work in.

Under different circumstances, I might suggest being direct about your suspicions of emotional abuse and neglect, but as you say yourself, that could backfire on the advisor's other students and postdocs.  That's their fight to have, not yours.

If the advisor is as emotionally abusive as you suspect, he may try to pull you into an argument or blackmail you.  He may say things like "I got you admitted to this department; you owe me." or "I'll have you kicked out of the program." or "I'm big and famous and important, and I know everybody, and you've just signed your academic death warrant."  Do not engage.  Do not argue.  Do not back down.  You have neither signed a contract nor sworn an oath of fealty.  The most you owe him is your sincere thanks and your future success, on your own terms.  Assuming you work in a healthy department, his threats are idle.

That said, you should have someone in your corner, just in case his threats are not idle.  Before you dump your advisor, I strongly recommend having an honest and confidential discussion with the graduate director, ombudsman, department chair, or another trusted senior faculty member.  (The other students will know who to talk to.)  Be completely straightforward about your concerns, especially about possible repercussions from your decision.  Hopefully they will reassure you that your concerns are groundless, or at least that someone else is willing to fight for you to be treated fairly.

If not, you're better off in a different department anyway.


Immature papers on arXiv I am from computer science and we typically submit to conferences and less often to journals. Publishing pre-prints to arXiv becomes more and more popular in my field. From the discussion here on AS I get the impression that arXiv is more than just putting something on a personal website.
For example from What to do when you spot a paper on arXiv with the same essential material as yours? I get that I should discuss arXiv papers if they are related to your work.
Now, a paper for a CS conference contains often about 75% theory + 25% experimental section. The experimental section takes a lot of time - so I wonder (and fear)  if there is a trend to upload just the bare minimum to arXiv in order to get credit for the idea.
Is this a problem? Maybe similar to patent-trolls, just uploading vague ideas in the hope to get citations?
Edit: For clarification: I am working in the field of data-mining, where it is common to have experiments to show that your idea does not only work in theory. This question/concern came up as we discussed the pro and cons of uploading our work to arXiv, since we have never done this before, but it seems to become more common in our field.
Edit 2: It seems that more people are concerned with this problem, especially in machine learning:
Yoav Goldberg:

This post is also an ideological action w.r.t arxiv publishing: while
I agree that short publication cycles on arxiv can be better than the
lengthy peer-review process we now have, there is also a rising trend
of people using arxiv for flag-planting, and to circumvent the
peer-review process. This is especially true for work coming from
“strong” groups. Currently, there is practically no downside of
posting your (often very preliminary, often incomplete) work to arxiv,
only potential benefits.

Yoav Goldberg:

I do not mind posting papers quickly on arxiv. I recognize the obvious
benefits of arxiv publishing and fast turnarounds. But one should also
acknowledge its shortcomings. In particular, I am concerned about the
conflation of science and PR that arxiv facilitates; the
rich-get-richer effects and abuse of power; and some of the current
arxiv publishing dynamics in the DL community. It is OK to post early
on arxiv.
It is NOT OK to misrepresent and over-claim what you did.
Sloppy papers with broad titles such as “Adversarial Generation of
Natural Language” are harmful. It is exactly the difference between
the patent system (which is overall a reasonable idea) and patent
trolling (which is a harmful abuse).

[...]

Most people don’t read the papers in depth but only the title and
sometimes the abstract and sometimes the intro. And when the papers
come from established groups, people tend to trust the claims without
verification. “Serious researchers” might not fall for this, but the
general population sure does get mislead. And by the general
population I mean people who are not actively working in this exact
sub-field. This includes practitioners in industry, colleagues,
prospective students, prospective reviewers of papers and grants. In
the short time since this paper came out, I already heard, on several
occasions, “oh, you are interested in generation? have you tried using
GANs? I saw this recent paper in which they get cool results with
adversarial learning for NLG”. This will be extremely harmful and
annoying for NLG researchers who apply for grants in the coming year
(remember, many grants are reviewed by a panel of capable but
non-specialized experts), as they will have to either waste precious
space and effort in dealing with this paper and with Hu et al and
explaining why they are irrelevant, or be dismissed as working on this
“already solved problem”, despite the fact that neither the paper in
question nor Hu et al actually did very much, and despite the fact
that both papers have terrible evaluations.

And the follow-up discussion on reddit

It seems to me that this question is less about the arxiv per se and more about how to navigate doing research in a very fast moving academic field.

  I get the impression that arXiv is more than just putting something on a personal website.

It's certainly different.  The main differences are:

(i) Many more people will see your paper.
(ii) Your paper will indeed be archived, essentially permanently.  (Withdrawing a paper from the arxiv has the effect of uploading a new, empty version.  Older versions are still there!)  On your own website, you can take things down at least as quickly and easily as you can put them up.
(iii) Some (very obnoxious) journals may regard posting on the arxiv as "prior publication".  (This is strictly unheard of in my field, mathematics.  My guess is that CS is close enough to math so that it is at least very rare in yours.)
(iv) Minimum standards of completeness and professionalism are enforced on the arxiv.  These are enumerated on the site itself, but the gist of it is that they are looking for manuscripts at the last step before conference/journal submission or later.  They are not looking for early drafts.

Of  these points, probably the last is most relevant to you.  If it is standard in your subfield to include 25% experimental data [you say that is standard in "CS", but that is certainly not true across the entire field], then a paper uploaded to the arxiv without that would probably look to many in your field to be incomplete, which is against the spirit and perhaps the rules of the arxiv.  So I wouldn't recommend it.

But the situation doesn't fundamentally change for papers that you or others post on your own website.  The phrasing in your question suggests that you feel that you might not have to "be responsive" in the academic sense to papers that you find on people's webpages (only).  That's not true.  As an academic you have to be responsive to others' work wherever you find it.

In terms of the prospect of people uploading "the bare minimum to arXiv in order to get credit for the idea": is this an actual problem for you or just something you are wondering might be a problem?  I have never encountered this problem in my work.  That you are wondering whether it might be a problem makes me think you may be a quite new researcher and haven't fully grasped the way the academic community works.  (Which is fine, and you have only to look forward to understanding it better.  But you should talk to others, including advisors and mentors, to try to get a better idea.)  Academia places a great privilege on completed work for exactly this reason.  If you put out a manuscript which, say, modifies an algorithm and hints that it could be faster in some situations, the most likely reaction you'll get is "Go on..."

This question may finally have made me understand what people on this site are on about when they say things like "An idea is worthless".  An idea is certainly not worthless, but a vague and unimplemented idea is of highly uncertain value, to the point where rushing to publish "only the vague idea" would be a very poor, um, idea.

By the way, you don't have to immediately drop something because someone else had "the same idea" and put out a paper before you.  Much -- perhaps most -- important academic work overlaps with other work and even more of it refines and extends the ideas of others.  How to respond to seeing "your idea" in another paper is a topic for a different answer.

Finally, let me say: if what you've done, are doing or want to do has real value, then it is unlikely to be received with thunderous applause this week and totally ignored next week.  If you're living in fear that someone else will say what you want to say, maybe slow down and find more to say.


When writing a letter of reference, is there any reason not to show it to the student? I only agree to write a reference letter if I can write a positive one. Although it is only hypothetical at this point, I would hesitate to write a reference letter for an individual who chooses not to waive their right to see it. That said, I have sometimes shown students my letters for them since I feel it is useful for them to know what I have written. It also provides them a chance to remind me of things I may have forgotten. I do not do this consistently, but am considering making it a personal policy.

I guess I have two questions. Is there a reason not to show a student their letter of reference? Just to be clear, this is for a letter I have written for the student and not for a reference I have recieved. The second question is, is it reasonable to refuse to write a reference for a student when the student does not waive their right to see the reference.

Is there a reason not to show a student their letter of reference?

One important reason is if you make direct comparisons with other students, which is one of the most useful things you can do in a letter.  If you say "this student is even more promising than X, and perhaps comparable with Y, but not quite as strong as Z", then it doesn't seem appropriate to tell the student.  Even if your letter doesn't name anyone specific, but instead says "this student was among the top two in a class of twenty-five", it still leaks a little information about how other students performed in the class.

Even aside from direct comparisons, you'll be making implicit comparisons if several students compare the letters you wrote for them to see whose is more enthusiastic.  That doesn't raise the same ethical issues, but it's still awkward.  I have no interest in telling students my private opinion of how they compare with each other.

  The second question is, is it reasonable to refuse to write a reference for a student when the student does not waive their right to see the reference.

Why not?  The fundamental question here is whether you ever have an obligation to write a letter.  In general I'd say no, although there are cases in which it would be offensive to refuse to write for anything less than very serious reasons.  (For example, Ph.D. advisors owe letters to graduating students.)  Under most circumstances, refusing to waive the right to see the letter sounds to me like a fine reason to decline to write one.

There are also all sorts of intermediate options you could choose.  For example, you could tell the student you would have to write something like "I warned this student that I could not write a compelling letter if he did not waive the right to see it, because I would be unable to compare him with other students.  He insisted that he needed a letter from me but was unwilling to waive this right, so I will do the best I can.  I can confirm that he received an A in my class and has sufficient preparation for further study in this field."


Experience needed to transition from undergrad to graduate school of two completely different majors I just graduated in May 2018 with an undergraduate bachelor degree in Computer Science from a pretty good university. During my time at the university, I always had aspirations of attending graduate school for a Masters (as a terminal degree). I had considered studying Computer Science, but during my final semester, I enjoyed the 400-level "Statistics and Probability I" course immensely that I had to take, making me re-think my decision of area of study in graduate school.

I focused mainly on my undergraduate courses along with becoming a course assistant (i.e. like a TA) for a Computer Architecture course for three semesters. I did not do any research or work closely with a professor in a related field while obtaining my degree, something I strongly wish I had done. Although, I have done two computer science-related internships in my final two summers as an undergraduate.

On top of this, my cumulative GPA feels incredibly mediocre at just a 3.34.

I am left with thinking of what the best possible path from here is, in the hopes of obtaining a Masters in Statistics. I have a few options I am looking at:

1.) Graduate schools across the board require letters of recommendations. Yes, I do have the professor I was a course assistant under, another professor that has gotten to know me well through course work, and internship mentors that have seen my industry intership work. However, I have been in talks with a professor on a PhD candidate board that notes that letters of recs for graduate school should come from professors you have worked closely with (i.e. through research) (he notes no distinction from masters vs. PhD).

Should I look for a research assistant position at a university institution before applying for graduate school (i.e. spend about a year doing research - spring and fall) in hopes of gaining experience and having a professor get to know me in an academia sense?

2.) Should I apply to a Post-Baccalaureate program in statistics to demonstrate a better GPA and to find a prospecting professor to do research with? I have the mathematics foundation (e.g. Calc 1, 2, & 3 and linear algebra), however, I obviously do not have a lot of statistics under me (e.g. one course as noted above).

I am leaning towards #1, however, I see the benefits of #2 too.

If anyone has any other recommendations, please send them my way. I am a bit nervous about wasting any time any one area, unless it is the right move. I would greatly appreciate feedback!

There is a big difference between a Masters program and a PhD program, and there is also a difference between a Masters program by coursework, and a Masters program by research.  Suitability of programs like these, and their entry requirements, generally depend on the specifics of the program and the entry standards of the university.  Having said this, I will try to give some general guidance on this matter.

Master of Statistics (coursework-based): For a student such as yourself, who has an undergraduate degree in a quantitative area outside of statistics (but with a small amount of statistics in that program), a Masters degree by coursework would be an obvious place to start.  A coursework-based Master of Statistics program is generally a good fit for someone coming over from another quantitative degree.  Indeed, these programs are usually designed for students who did not do an undergraduate degree in statistics, but have enough background in mathematics to be able to learn the subject more rapidly than would occur in an undergraduate degree.  (Student who already have an undergraduate degree in statistics may be able to jump this hurdle and go straight into a PhD program.)

Although it varies by university, entry into a coursework-based Master of Statistics program would not usually require an undergraduate degree in the same field, or any research experience.  It would usually be sufficient to have an undergraduate degree in a quantitative subject where you have done the core maths requirements (calculus, linear algebra, etc.) that would allow you to understand graduate-level statistics courses.  If this is a program of interest to you, my advice would be to make inquiries with the universities that are suitable to you, and find out the entry requirements for their programs.

Master of Statistics (research-based): Research-based programs generally have higher entry expectations than coursework-based programs, so for these programs it might be hard to get in (or to do the work) if you do not have a solid undergraduate education in statistics.  For a student like yourself, the more usual path would be to start in a coursework-based masters program first, and then progress to research once you have done enough courses to give you a good grounding in the subject.  In some masters programs there is a combination of coursework and then research.  The coursework comes first and then the research occurs when you have a solid grounding in the field.

Putting the cart before the horse: I am a bit surprised at your suggestion that you would pursue a research assistant position as a means of trying to get entry to a masters program.  You already have some experience as a research assistant, so what you are lacking is not this experience, but rather, coursework in statistics.  In your situation I would think that you could apply directly for course-work based programs in statistics, and this would then be a lead-in to later research programs.


Where to buy non-kindle-format (epub,azw) e-books which look like the printed books? If I want to buy e-copy of academic books, most of the publishers (Oxford, Cambridge, etc.) direct to amazon store or allow epub version. However, I do not want the e-pub or other formats (e.g. azw) as the ebook in this format does not have the actual pagination and format of the printed copy.
So, is there a store or place where I can buy the e-copy of the book (preferably in pdf format) which actually looks like the printed copy (having the actual page numbers and format/style of the printed copy)?
I am aware that some of the kindle books do come with both "locations" and "actual page numbers" to avoid the above problem. However, this is feature is not available for the majority of the books (as I open the sample version and check). Also, I miss the style/formatting of the printed book.

I have the same problem. For Springer, I usually buy at its website, where you can find the PDF version. For Oxford and Cambridge, when I cannot find a decent Kindle version, I usually buy at ebooks.
However, for ebooks.com:

The number of available titles is limited, and I couldn't find titles that according to the publishers should be available as e-books.
The PDF is DRM-protected, which is an annoyance.


How to handle off-topic questions during an interview for a PhD/academic position? While offering an answer to another question on this site (this one if you're interested), I was reminded of a particularly challenging experience that occurred during my interview process that might generalize to others.

I went to a decently well-known and respected undergraduate university, and while I was interviewing for a PhD position at various schools, at least one of my interviewers usually asked me how I could help his son/daughter/nephew, etc. get into my undergraduate university. This was not at the end of the interview when all other questions (both his and mine) were answered, but rather it was at the very beginning of the interview (e.g. "Oh, I see you went to university X. My [insert familial relationship] is applying there this year/next year. How can s/he get in?")

Not knowing if I was in a position to decline to comment, I gave some brief, generic suggestions and then tried to steer the interview back to my own application and admissions.

I can see this possibly happening in many scenarios, from graduate admissions (like my own experience) to possibly postdoc or faculty job interviews. Has anyone else faced this sort of situation before (off-topic questions that while not "illegal" are somewhat uncomfortable to answer), and any suggestions on how to diplomatically handle it?

Such a question at the start of an interview sounds to me like a poor "warmup" question - meant to be an easy lowball, and failing miserably. As such I think a light answer is all that would be expected - they are not asking for help, but thinking this is one you could easily answer. Your reply should demonstrate you can think on your feet, without appearing to put the interviewer down and without really engaging in an answer. For example

  I met such a variety of people there that I really can't tell you what they had in common - I guess you would have to ask the admissions office

That's probably quite truthful, while being completely evasive. And then you can move on.


Creating bibliographies, 25 years ago I'm interested in the academic history of creating a bibliographic reference list. The time period is early 1990s. I want to understand how former researchers have done their writing.

Introduction

25 years ago in the year 1993 scientific publishing was not done with Internet but somehow else. From the history lesson it is known, that the first electronic OPAC systems were invented and they were used in many university libraries. The OPAC catalog didn't contain the fulltext article but only the bibliographic references, for example author, title and year. The technology behind the early OPAC system was perhaps a desktop IBM PC, but I'm not sure. It is also possible that no electronic OPAC was available but only the good old card based catalog. In any case, the cards were not handwritten but with a typewriter, so the user of the library were able to find the correct book in a short amount of time.

Question

After the short introduction for explaining the general environment in the early 1990s there are some open question which I wasn't able to answer alone with literature research. So perhaps somebody has a personal experience and knows the details. The problem is, how the researcher can write his manuscript with a mix of a card based catalog and an early digital OPAC. The problem with the OPAC in that time was, that no copy & paste was possible. Suppose, I've found an interesting title on the screen, whats next? Should I write down the bibliographic reference direct in the manuscript or can I send the information to somebody else? A similar problem is given with the card catalog. Suppose, the researcher found an interesting looking entry. Probably it was not allowed to take the card out of the catalog and insert it in the own bibliographic references, so how has the researcher in that area solved the problem?

The next question is the sorting of the bibliographic references. Suppose, somebody has written down all the entries and want to insert a new entry alphabetically. What is the best practice method for doing so?

Oh my. We are quite a history-less field, aren't we, in computing? I programmed an OPAC system in the 1980s and we were not the first by any means. What you mean by "bibliographic information" is called metadata. There were many different systems (MARC - Machine-readable Catalogue) around. We argued about things like having multiple of the same tag for all the different authors or having different tags so we could model the order of the authors. In Germany the art of cataloging literature goes back more than a century. There is the Regeln für die alphabetische Katalogisierung (RAK) that was put forth in the 70s to get away from that horrible Preußischen Instruktion used since 1899 or so.

We used index cards for keeping track of references in our own publications. We used pen and pencil to write on the cards, or even typed them up on a typewriter. The cards were very easy to sort (and re-sort), so the last thing you did was type up the reference list. Or you used BibTeX, if you had access to a machine that could run it. There were lots of computers before the IBM PC, they just weren't personal computers. If you didn't have access to a computer, you used a typewriter and lots of Tipp-Ex. Or you ended up retyping every page when the number of errors got to be too many.

I suggest reading up on the history of library catalogues (VOX will point you to a book in English on the subject) and then about OPACS if you want to look a bit deeper into the history. But you need to go back more than 25 years.


Scanned Letter of Recommendation versus Saved as PDF Question from my professor :

While filling in a request for Recommendation Letter, portal said

  Please upload PDF File. Do not print recommendation and scan as PDF

My professor had printed the letter on college letterhead, signed it, scanned and saved as PDF well in advance.
And now he is confused about what should be done.

Kindly advise
1. Upload the Scanned PDF
2. Save the letter from docx to PDF and upload. This document won't have letterhead or the signature.

I was under the impression that most universities use OCR to process letter, hence scanned documents would suffice.

The instructions seem simple enough for your professor to follow. However, if still in doubt, you could contact the University concerned and see if you could come to a conclusion regarding this matter.


Age vs career in natural science Due to my country's education (we finish high school later than other countries), a year off, doing master's degree, I am finding myself in my first year of PhD in States   being 26 years old, possibly graduating when I am 30. I have recently become very anxious about my age, since scientific career has been always my goal, I feel like I am too old and behind everyone else. In Europe, where I am from, I have been told that age does not matter as much, and what matters is papers/scientific output, especially since the end of PhD, in support of me pursuing the doctoral degree in USA, where it takes longer. I am doing my PhD at one of the top tier schools in a very prolific group, where I am surrounded by people that got their PhD when they were 25...
In addition I know from experience of me and others that in my field (physics) women are heavily biased against at all stages. Also, my field requires completion of usually 2 post-docs before applying for positions, which would take around 5 years.

I am looking for some input on this and how realistic  my chances of staying in academia are, how much age matters when hiring for post-docs/faculty positions (in Europe) and how to cope with age related anxiety in academia.

Probably, age at graduation is not the most important factor for a career in academia. But assuming it was, then according to your estimate (30), you should be rather competitive.

  For the 2003 doctorate recipients, the median total time from
  baccalaureate to doctorate was 10.1 years, while the median registered
  time was 7.5 years and the median age at doctorate was 33.3 years.

Time to Degree of U.S. Research Doctorate Recipients

(Being 33 and just about to submit my thesis, I'm right on target.) Also notice that with your pre-PhD degree, you are already looking back at a  a few years of scientific education that your US peers lack, if they start grad school with a bachelors degree. Academic employers know this.

Maybe this is not a full answer to your question, but at least a consolation. Don't panic.


An outline slide in a lecture? When giving research presentations, I don't use outline slides since I am normally telling a story and believe that it is a poor use of time (hopefully I'm not instigating a debate, I just wanted to see if my logic extends to lectures)

However, I'm tempted to start including them in lectures so that students know what to expect and have an idea of the concepts being presented. I'm also thinking about the style where you periodically recall the outline to help keep the big picture.

When doing chalkboard lectures, if the answer is "yes" to the above, I would assume the same holds there. Probably a good use of time at the beginning, right?

When giving a talk, no matter how good a storyteller you are, some significant percentage of your audience will be distracted at any given time. Outline slides are extremely valuable for helping those people catch up and rejoin your presentation.

What you don't have to do, however, is have a dry list outline. Whenever possible, I like to use a diagram instead, which unites the whole thing graphically, and indicate which aspects of the diagram we are currently dealing with. Nicely, this works quite well in chalk talks too.


Should one update a manuscript to current state-of-art when re-submitting? Publishing in a journal is a long process that might take a lot of time (> 1 year), and is possibly involved of several phases (submit, re-submit, re-re-submit...)

As the time passes, things change. Specifically, new results appear.

What should one do with the new stuff that happens between resubmissions?

Do one needs to cite / refer to papers that first appeared after the original date submission?
Do one needs to update citations to papers that on the date of the original submission appeared only on arXiv, but now appear in a journal (those possibly slightly different than the original work cited in the original submission)?

EDIT:
 maybe one should wait for acceptance, and only then do the updates?

Yes, you should update your references at every possible opportunity.  Whenever the manuscript is in your hands, if it is possible for you to update the references, you should do so.  Paper rejected?  Update the references before resubmission.  Paper accepted?  Update the references before sending back the revision.  Multiple rounds of reviewing?  Update the references after each round.  Submitting a journal version of a conference paper?  Update the references before submission.  Reviewing galley proofs?  Okay, then you probably can't update the references.

Your paper serves as not only a description of your new result but also as a guide to the surrounding literature.  Your readers (including referees and editors) are best served by the most up-to-date snapshot possible.

Of course, if one of the papers you cite has undergone a revision (for example, and ArXiv preprint has appeared in a journal), you must read the new revision yourself to make sure that the cited information is still there, so that you know how to appropriately cite it.

I typically tag completely new references (for example, a relevant ArXiv preprint appears while my paper is under review) with phrases like "Since this paper was submitted..." or (since I'm in computer science) "Since the preliminary version of this paper appeared...."


Could not get along with any advisor, is it ego? During my academic studies, I have always been ambitious in pursuing academic research with no luck. I have not gotten along with any of the professors whom I attempted to set up an advisor-advisee relationship with. This was not due to my lack of knowledge or incapability because they acknowledged my competency many times.

I have started to think that they were too lazy to adjust to my eagerness and wanted to take it easy. Maybe they thought that I will be a burden for them. Also, I get the impression that they hate me, because of the disgust they seem to exhibit when I talk about the work of leading researchers in the field. If I do not follow or discuss the leading researchers work how can I contribute to the field?

Please give me some advice on ego problems of academics, and how to politely show them that their research is inferior without making them hate me.

I am very respectful. But my former professor asked me if I do not like his work. I criticized the professor's work, and professor could not tolerate to it. If I was wrong prof could have told me the true value of the work, instead he stayed quiet and took revenge on me. I always choose wrong persons - I can't recognize good and bad people in my relationships. My love life is also a disaster. Always credit bad ones in every aspect of life.

I am in a 3rd world country in the Middle East. Here, finding someone with an inferior work is like finding a water in a desert. My intention is using them for future Ph.D admissions in the western world. I am interested in their connections and network. But, they hide it from me, they want me to stay with them forever, and then they hate me. They are usually western educated PhDs - from the ones that return back and usually produce low-quality papers.

Back when I was in grad school and everybody I knew lived with roommates due to housing costs, some sets of roommates got along well and some had serious problems sharing space with one another.  Over time, I noticed that while most people had mostly decent experiences, there were certain people who I knew who always seemed to end up with nightmarish roommates.  The same way, while most people seemed to have their share of ups and downs in their love life, certain people always seemed to end up with nightmarish relationships.

Was it just bad luck or a bad environment?  Generally not: when a person has an unusually long string of failed relationships, usually that person is somehow involved in creating their luck.

I tell this by way of suggesting that you may want to reflect on your own choices here.  Are you poisoning the relationships with your professors by holding a contemptuous attitude towards them?  Is your ambition somehow leading you toward selecting professors who are incompatible with you?  Is it something else entirely?

It's impossible for we strangers on the internet to tell what's really going on for you.  It is certain, however, that every failed advisor/advisee relationship that you have been involved with has at least one thing in common: you.  It's worth reflecting on that and seeing if you can figure out something that you can change in your own attitudes that might make it easier for the next one to be better.


Humanities for people with poor preparation? As someone in a math-heavy field, the advice one is generally given if one's preparation for potentially going into graduate school is poor boils down to the following:

Do better in a class that succeeds the class you did badly in. The example, I think, was something like "if you did badly in algebra, take algebraic topology." But in undergraduate humanities programmes, there isn't necessarily as obvious a succession unless one looks at course numbering and intensity (e.g. presumbly a small seminar in the high 200's will be more intensive than a large survey introductory lecture class).
Do RA work for a year or two after one's undergraduate years (which might allow one to take discounted classes). But I am unsure if RA work is as plentiful among, say, scholars of Marx or medieval theology as it might be to biochemists or economists. Naturally, it would seem that there's probably some demand for translators or archivists, and I know people who have interned at museums as researchers, so maybe I'm not aware of something.

So I feel like it's hard to map advice in more overly structured programmes that may also emphasize things like hard data more to the humanities.

Is this true, and if so, what would be good advice for such situations?

Humanities prof in the US here. You are indeed correct that there aren't, generally speaking, research assistantships available at the undergraduate level in humanities. It's just not that easy even for a very capable, very motivated undergraduate to contribute much meaningful to the writing of a scholarly paper in most humanities fields.

The best advice is to figure out exactly why you did poorly in the earlier course, correct the problem and then work very hard is a subsequent humanities course. You want to show that the one bad mark is an outlier.

More generally, the best advice for success in humanities courses and applications to humanities graduate programs is to learn to write really well. If you can learn to write careful, focused, clearly argued essays that people actually enjoy reading, you'll have a definite leg up on the competition. Your bad marks might keep you from making the cut at some programs, but if you blow the writing sample away, you might become very competitive at programs that treat their admissions more holistically. (My sense, which is not very reliable, is that admissions decisions in the humanities tend to be a bit more holistic in general than in the sciences, since UG programs tend to vary much more in the humanities than in the sciences.)


How to connect with those distant senior colleagues who are in their last PhD year? I have some senior colleagues in their final year of PhD. busy most of their time and in quite stress (as much any last year PhD student). we share a lot of history together. and also have some sort of common academic fields interests. It has been a really long time since we got together.

I am interested in partnering with them doing some projects together. What is the proper way of connecting to them ? what the best way of explaining what i would like to do with them. I am afraid that an extra profession email would be silly but also a too friendly one would be understood as unserious.

If i happen to talk to them what kind of topics that should not be brought up? for a PhD student in his last year of program.

If they are in their last year, collaboration might not be practical. Last year students are typically writing their thesis, applying for jobs, etc. Further, they may leave academia after graduation.

With this in mind, you can treat them like you would anyone else. An informal e-mail should do fine, or you can request a phone/Skype connection.


Entering into PhD program after having dropped out of bachelor's When I was 23, I quit my computer science undergraduate studies at USC with only one semester worth of units left and a low (less than 3.0) GPA due to personal reasons.  I just turned 30 and have rekindled a desire to pursue research in computational neuroscience.  Is there any realistic hope of eventually getting into a PhD program and pursuing a career in academia, or is it too much of a long shot given my personal circumstances and the job market?

Basically, what I want to know is, if I were to finish my BS, kick ass in a master's program (applied mathematics), and have great GRE scores, would that overcome my abysmal undergraduate record and gap in years away from school?

The biggest obstacle in my view is getting into a terminal master's program with my undergraduate record.  If I were to get into a 1-year terminal master's program in mathematics at a sub-par university and do great, would I have a chance at a higher ranked university for my PhD?

The odds of a career in academia are long in general, and certainly your situation is going to make the odds even longer.

That said, people tend to only look at your most recent degree.  It seems pretty likely that if you got into a masters program and did very well there, you'd have a good shot at getting into a solid Ph.D. program.  But you'd actually have to do very well in the masters program (probably "best in several years" level).  Furthermore, even once you get into a solid Ph.D. program the odds are against your getting a job in academia.


Should I be worried about the fact that I will be too old for applying for tenure track positions by the time I complete postdoc? I am 30 years old. I have spent 4 yrs in undergrad, 2 in masters and 5 in PhD with half a year of work experience in between. I have just finished my PhD and will start with a postdoc position early next year. Considering I spend 2-3 years in a postdoc. By the time I apply for TT positions, I will be 33yo. I have heard that hiring committees prefer younger candidates (<30) than older ones. Considering I have a good application, should I be worried about the fact that I will be too old for applying for tenure track positions by the time I complete postdoc?

I would be applying for TT positions in India, Canada and US.

Hiring committees do care about how many years it’s been since you got your PhD, but they more-or-less don’t care at all about what happened before you received your PhD.  I think you’ve misunderstood what people meant by “younger.”  I took 7 years in grad school and it caused no issues whatsoever.


Is the arXiv a good way to get feedback on one's work? I have developed a method to process images I use for my research. It's nothing revolutionary but I think it might be useful to others than me, and why not, be worthy of being published somewhere (at least for me to cite when I use it).

As it is outside my primary field of research, nobody in my direct lab vicinity can help evaluating its scientific value or novelty (I did a bit of literature research and didn't find any obvious precedent). Normally I would just put it as an appendix in the first article where I use it, but this one is quite long to describe and completely out of my field. It would thus be off-topic in the journals in which I usually publish.

I though of seeking collaboration from someone in my university who works in signal/image processing, I don't know anyone personally and I foresee possible political issues, authorship quarrels, etc. I would nonetheless like to get some sort of evaluation before submitting to a journal. As an outsider, I wouldn't like to waste an editor's time and make a fool of myself.

I have zero experience submitting to the arXiv, by looking at the website it's not clear how/if there is an active system of feedback, even informal.

Is it advisable to submit my methods paper there and expect a feedback?

There is not much of a "formal feedback" system associated with the arxiv.  I say "not much" instead of "none" because the arxiv apparently does do some degree of automatic tracking of citations to its papers.  For instance this arxiv submission contains a link to a MO post in which my paper is (briefly) mentioned.  I had not seen that post before, so that was somewhat interesting.  However, I don't know how this system works and it seems to be much less systematic than, say, what google scholar does.  In particular, I have 25 arxiv preprints and the arxiv itself lists this kind of citation for very few of them, whereas google scholar lists much more.

In terms of an informal feedback system: yes, the arxiv works very well for that, in the following organic way: for many academic fields and subfields it is by far the one place to put your preprint in order to get the most (and the most interested) people to read it.  This includes publication in most journals and the implications this has had on some academic fields are immense.  E.g. I hear that in theoretical physics -- a fast-moving field in which it is apparently rare to look up a paper written much more than ten years ago -- pretty much everyone who is anyone uploads their preprints to the arxiv, and as a result theoretical physicists almost never go to the library anymore or look through actual journal papers: they don't need to.  My field -- mathematics -- seems to be converging to this kind of phenomenon rather more slowly.

On the other hand, to expect feedback may be putting it a bit strongly.  The volume of papers uploaded to the arxiv is fast and rapidly increasing.  I just looked at the math.NT arxiv submissions, and last night 15 papers were uploaded.  I am a number theorist with broad interests, and if these papers came at a rate of one a day or less, I would probably peruse about half of them.  But the current volume forces me to be much more selective.  The arxiv is great advertising, but all the advertising in the world doesn't guarantee that people will engage with your product rather than the sea of competing products (competing for their attention, anyway; they need not be competing with you in the academic sense).

In my experience, I most definitely get enough feedback from my arxiv submissions in order to justify uploading them (although there are arguments to be made for doing so even if you never hear directly from anyone about them).  It happens that in the last three weeks or so I have uploaded four arxiv submissions.  (Since I have 25 altogether, this is obviously a spike in the upload rate.  Some other people do this too.  Now that I think about it, from an advertising perspective it would probably be better not to do this.)  Since then I have received comments on two of the four papers.  The two papers that I haven't heard from yet are I think perfectly solid and interesting -- in fact, one of the two concerns the Combinatorial Nullstellensatz so probably has broader appeal than most papers I have written, and the other is a really substantial project that I did jointly with my PhD student -- so the fact that I've gotten no feedback about them seems to be mostly random.

In summary: yes, posting your papers on the arxiv is a great way to get feedback.  Will it guarantee feedback?  No, guaranteed feedback is exactly what you're buying (so to speak) when you submit to a journal.  Other than that it seems impossible to guarantee. I would definitely submit to the arxiv and see what happens.  If you hear nothing, then you might try sending a few emails to suspected experts which just point to your arxiv preprint.  Having an arxiv preprint versus just enclosing a file adds a certain veneer of legitimacy.


Doubt regarding authorship One of the master's student is working on a research problem. I am a PhD student. I have an idea which I proposed to my advisor on the same problem. Now he wants me and the masters student to work on that idea and publish a paper. Would I be treated as a first author in that paper or would I be a second author?

You give a partial version of the story using pejoratives instead of trying to stay based on facts. So it is difficult to answer your question with that information.

What we can say is that authorship is something to be discussed with your advisor. It will be his decision, in the end. A good way to help yourself is to work hard on that idea, and clearly make your point. The best way to help yourself be first author is to write the paper, or at least the more significant portions of it! Start already with introduction and methods, and as soon as results are gathered, write it up and then submit it to your advisor. If you have done a large part of the work and wrote the manuscript, you should have no problem being first author.


How do ects grades compare to American grades? How does the ECTS ABCD etc grades compare to the American ones?

Would I in particular be right in saying that the European B is worth more than the American B?

They don't compare at all.

With ECTS, grades correspond to relative position of the student for a given course. For example, A is for the top 10%, B for the next 25%, and so on. These percentages are out of passing students – even E is a passing grade, by definition. Students who fail get F or FX depending on the severity of failure. This is based on statistical data for that year and previous years, so that if in some year many students perform exceptionally well (or bad), then that should be taken into account, in theory.
(Converting grades is not an easy task. In my understanding the letter grades are not used anymore, rather the administration will actually convert the local grade into a foreign grade. There is an example in Annex B of the ECTS guide from 2015.)
See this page for more information: http://ec.europa.eu/education/ects/users-guide/grade-distribution_en.htm

Grades in the US are completely different. First, the passing grade is often C, not E, therefore the distribution of grades will obviously be different. From what I understand (correct me if I am wrong), anything lower than a B+ is quite bad for undergrad courses.
Moreover grades are not necessarily correlated with the student's standing relative to other students, unless the grading is done on a curve (which an outsider does not know) – it's possible for everyone to get an A, which is by definition impossible with ECTS grading.


How to handle someone propositioning me to collude/cheat with them on an assignment? I am doing my final year of undergraduate.
Mostly I am working on my Honours project
but I have a few units from earlier years that I am still doing
 as I did some out of order.

Another student, call him John, sent me a message on Facebook (via the message people who are not your friends feature.), saying basically:

  "Can you send me the solutions to the Assignment from unit X, that you
  took last year. In exchange, I will tell you what the future minitest
  questions are for unit Y that we are both doing this year."

Attempted Collusion is not explicitly mentioned in the Universities Academic misconduct guide.

Unit Y has weekly minitests, that are worth in total something like 15% of our final grade.
The minitests happen during tutorials.
There are 3 tutorials each week, on different days, with roughly a third of the class in each.
Each minitest is the same, across all streams.
They are mostly a way to check up and see that you understand the content.

They have at the top of each page:

  IT IS NOT PERMITTED TO TAKE THIS PAPER AWAY FROM THE TUTORIAL SESSION OR TO DIVULGE ITS CONTENT

John is in the first tutorial of the week.
So he would find out the questions first,
then could tell me them so I could study for them, for when my tutorial is.

What he apparently doesn't realize is that I too am in the first tutorial group (with him).

I guess Unit X is using the same assignment as last year. Or a similar one.
Or that John thinks it is.

A complicating factor is that I really dislike John. He doesn't seem to have realised this.
I find him personally annoying, and consider him a poor student.
I don't understand how he has managed to pass enough units to have not been suspended for poor performance.
It may be he is very good at exams, or it may be that he has been cheating all along.

I have a number of options, and could do one or more of them:

Ignore it, and block him on Facebook.
Tell him no, and refer him to the universities plagiarism/cheating policy
Speak to the Professor of Unit Y about it (that we are both studying).
Speak to the Professor of Unit X about it.
Speak to the Head of School (sub-department), who is above both units
Speak to the University Dean. Who is in charge of enforcing the Academic Misconduct policy. (Will probably mean going though channels)

In my case, by coincidence, Unit X is being taught by the Head of School (who I have never studied under). But in the General Case both options exist, and I can approach him, either as the Head of School or as the Professor of the unit, I guess.

I think that ignoring is probably a bad option, if someone sees that I have been asked about this, and left it without response, they might think this is normal behaviour for me.

If I go to faculty, he may be suspended.
I worry that I am a bit too willing for that possibility as I don't like him.
On the other hand it isn't my job to decide the consequences of his actions.

Update:
I have spoken to the coordinator of Unit Y.
Who said if I wanted he would take it to the Dean
but that it would involve me having to do stuff.
He also said to contact the coordinator of Unit X (who happens to he head of school).
He is out of the country for a week so I sent him an email (CCed to the coordinator of Unit Y).
I also responded to John, saying No, and referring him to the Academic Misconduct policy.

Update2:
I got a response from the Coordinator of Unit X, saying he would look into it.
Unit X coordinator is on long-service leave (Not sure how that is going with him still coordinating the unit. He may be doing only light administrative tasks. Or it may be he forwarded it to the new coordinator).

Putting such a request in a written, verifiable manner as this student has done is incredibly dumb, and frankly merits whatever punishment is associated with this.

Although in principle you could simply ignore the request, I think this is one of those cases where you're better off reporting it. Otherwise, there's still the possibility that "John" could bring you down with him (he wrote you a note, after all!). So I would write to him declining the offer, and then report it.


What are the mechanics of negotiating a faculty job offer? I would like to know the following. This is for the US.

Is the deadline in the offer letter a deadline to come to a finished negotiation, or a deadline to say you'd like the job and then to enter into negotiations.

How exactly and with whom do you negotiate? Is it with the sender of the job offer, and is it usually done over email or a call? It seems email may have the advantage that there is a written record.

I'm thinking of ways of reducing the teaching burden by asking, for example, trying to minimize the number of unique courses over the years, while agreeing to the number of courses taught per semester in the job description. Is this a reasonable thing to ask for, and is it too vague?

What happens after the negotiations are finished? Do they revise the offer letter or do they draft a contract? How long does it usually take from finishing negotiations to confirming that you have the job (which I suppose is when a contract is sign)?

I'll assume this is for a permanent, not a temporary or part time position.

Unfortunately, there is no general advice that would be applicable everywhere. The US doesn't have a national system for such things, nor even one that applies to any single State. You may have a lot of flexibility or very little. But if the offer lays out a lot of things then you probably have less wiggle-room than if it only says a bit.

But you may get at least a promise that they will try to accommodate the needs of a new member of the faculty. Not too many preparations is a good thing to talk about and most universities will probably try to do that anyway, but it is hard to guarantee. Funding for travel is another thing to explore. But, you may not get any guarantees.

On the other hand, nearly everywhere will have an interest in bringing on a new member of the faculty smoothly and not inundating them with scut work. You might get a pass on committee assignments for a while. You might get a "promise" that you can teach in your specialty. But, depending on the size of the place and its main focus, the constraints may be strong. A large place with a research focus and lots of TAs probably finds it easier.

I was once at a top university where a lot of things were arranged around helping a young newcomer to the faculty advance her research agenda by inviting post-docs whom she favored. I was very impressed that the "old codgers" on the faculty were so supportive of a new person. But this is, I think, an outlier. Not every place can or will be so accommodating.

I also once negotiated a promise that the university would cover rather extensive international travel. I swapped a bit of salary for that, but everyone came out happy in the end.

If you want to negotiate, it is very useful if you can do it in person, probably with the program chair or even a Dean. If you can be flexible about some things, then, perhaps they can be flexible about others. Deans often have some pot of money they can use for such things. They also have a bit more flexibility with "bending" policies.

At the other end of the scale, I doubt that very many offers are "take it as is, or leave it." They will talk to you, nearly everywhere.

Yes, after you come to an agreement, a contract needs to be signed spelling out everything. You will probably only have a short time in which to sign and return it.


Paper author problem I'm a PhD student and I've written a paper on a numerical method, whose main contribution is a solution for piezoelectric problem. The paper uses some equations from the work of my MS degree. These equations are not the main novel parts in this paper but they are still important for the completeness of the method. I believe the paper's method is based on the work of MS and the current paper is a generalization of the MS work to a multi-physics problem.
Of course, I will talk with my previous advisor. But before that, I would like to ask here how do we deal with such a problem basically?

Which association of this paper belongs to? The current PhD university or the previous MS university? Or both?
I would be the first author, who will be second author and third author? My previous advisor or current advisor?
Is it possible that the previous advisor just lets us publicize without adding his name because he is also very busy and may have no time to revise this paper? (If he wants his name on the paper, he must give comments on it).

For me, I will be the first author for sure. So I am happy to include both advisors since it has no differences on me. But the problem is about the revision of the paper: I am a little worried that, if the previous advisor is busy,his comments on this paper may come very late. It may delay the submission of the paper. He is a good professor but he is very busy.

I'll give it a try...:

The association should be your current association:

First, it's where an interested reader from abroad can find you, and
secondly, your previous association even might be unhappy if you continue to publish papers with their name on it. (Just imagine some former member - not you, of course! - publishing substandard papers!)

If there are more authors from different universities, such as your former advisor, you should mention their association, too. Sometimes that will lead to a lot of fine-print in the header... but that's not a bad thing, when it comes to publishing: it signifies the work is up to standards of two or more different associations. And many people like to see some collaboration, for a change ;)

As for arranging the authors #2..N, a host of obscure and regional rules is applied :) At some institutions, the last place is considered to be the most honorable ("the chair"), sometimes authors are listed in descending order of importance of their contribution... which without fail will cause trouble when a team wants to publish something. Some resort to alphabetical order, or even comment on the rules applied in a footnote (which is a little bit absurd). So, talk it over with you co-authors :)

If someone can't make a contribution to the publication, the correct way would be not to give them as co-author, but to identifying their contribution (if it is significant - another controversial subject) in the paper. Conversely, if you want someone as co-author who isn't directly involved, like your former advisor, she or he might almost feel obliged to force some (sometimes impractical) changes, in order to justify their co-authorship. - Again, talk to them beforehand, everything is easier that way ;)


Found an error in my published conference paper I submitted a paper to a conference, and got it accepted. While I was preparing for the camera-ready version of it, I made a mistake and an error slipped in.

After the firm deadline, I asked if a correction was possible, but they said it's too late since it had gone through all the procedures. So, it seems my conference paper will be uploaded online with an error, which is not too obvious, but obvious enough that a careful reader can spot it.

I'm writing a journal version of it, and making sure it doesn't contain any error. Would it be okay to have the journal version published error-free, while the conference version has an error?

Many say that no one actually carefully reads conference papers as they are mainly aimed to let others know new results, and say that it is journal papers that others read with more care if available.

This is my first published conference paper, and it is really embarrassing. I was obssessed with finding typos, and blind to technical errors.

Thanks.

The reality is that the best answer is simply "get used to it". It is sad that this happened to you in your first conference paper, but things do get published with mistakes, and there is really nothing very much anyone can do about: you can proof read papers as often as you want, and there will always be mistakes. I'm not saying this because I am a nihilist but simply because I'm pragmatic: of course I want papers to be perfect; it just isn't practical.

The interesting question is only: how severe is the error. You don't answer this in your question above, but if it is really only a typo or misspelling, then it would not be worth your sleep. If it is a mistake that a reasonably educated reader will be able to understand as a mistake, the same would probably apply. If you submitted a proof that has a mistake and upon further thought you realize that the whole theorem is not true, that would be a separate matter -- but you wouldn't introduce such an error while dealing with the final version of the paper.