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Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

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Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#11

Post by anjc »

mxschumacher wrote: post #5

I wonder how the "Publish the Same Result Several Times" recommendation ties into the "publish or perish"-mantra. I suspect that 1997 was a different time. Many academics have a super-human publication cadence, not so much because of all the new knowledge they've extracted from the universe but because they aggressively re-publish their existing results. Very low read- and citation counts are common implications. Fro…

> they aggressively re-publish their existing results. Very low read- and citation counts are common implications.

I think it's generally the opposite to a great degree. Some people spend their PhD and postdoc doing one large piece of work, overly concerned about its rigour/correctness/validity, eventually publishing just one paper that they're happy with (perhaps a summary of their thesis). Others publish smaller pieces of work frequently, at conferences, workshops etc. In this time the latter will have built up a public academic profile, while the former may be essentially anonymous to the field. This will be reflected in greatly more citations and reads for the latter.

You could argue that there's value to the former approach, but if you can't disseminate your work effectively - i.e. nobody knows that you or your work exist - then it's useless (imo).

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#12

Post by projektfu »

mxschumacher wrote: post #5

I wonder how the "Publish the Same Result Several Times" recommendation ties into the "publish or perish"-mantra. I suspect that 1997 was a different time. Many academics have a super-human publication cadence, not so much because of all the new knowledge they've extracted from the universe but because they aggressively re-publish their existing results. Very low read- and citation counts are common implications. Fro…

The way it’s done now is to publish tiny incremental results. For example, you can get funding to study a class of a dozen drugs in a dozen exotic species. The results can be written in any number of papers from 1 to 144. Add two different test methods, and you can multiply as you see fit. If the journals reject a paper for being too small, just lump a few together and resubmit.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#13

Post by durnygbur »

These hints reminded me that we don't have "great scientists" anymore. Can you list recent Nobel Prize laureates?

Great scientists were basically people-institutions and all the mundane and scrupulous work was done by assistants, doctoral candidates, technicians, as we have an example of Hilbert and some much less known mathematician. There still exist relicts of this system in the academia.

With increasing emancipation and alternative opportunities this extend of exploitation of the nameless is not possible anymore, and this is good.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#14

Post by Forge36 »

Forge36 wrote: post #4

(I really enjoyed this article) It does take some effort to translate from academia to a corporate environment I'll try do so in a reply. High level points: Lecturing Blackboard Technique Publish the Same Result Several Times You Are More Likely to Be Remembered by Your Expository Work Every Mathematician Has Only a Few Tricks Do Not Worry about Your Mistakes Use the Feynman Method Give Lavish Acknowledgments Write I…

Present Directly

Present Clearly

Iterate On Your Work

Specialize: Add as much new detail to a single piece of work.

Everyone has specialized skills, there's fame in using them to their fullest potential to explore many areas.

>There are two kinds of mistakes. There are fatal mistakes that destroy a theory, but there are also contingent ones, which are useful in testing the stability of a theory.

Use the Feynman Method >keep a dozen of your favorite problems con- stantly present in your mind, [...] Every time you hear or read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of your twelve problems to see whether it helps.

Give Credit To Others no matter how small

Summarize Everything Clearly and as long as is necessary: show your work second.

Your position as an authority will change abruptly. (I'm have a harder time rephrasing this. Your work will go from "meh he's washed out" to "he's perfected his craft" for identical reasons depending on how well it's received)

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#15

Post by pflanze »

jamessb wrote: post #6
lorey wrote: post #3

Damn, I really like the design/layout. Anyone know where to find it by any chance?

The AMS uses LaTeX for typesetting. They release packages for their other journals [1], but not Notices , which apparently [2] uses Lucia Bright, a font that is not free. [1]: https://www.ams.org/arc/journals/journal-produce.html [2]: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/76053/which-font-is-...

The PDF file contains the string "/Creator (QuarkXPress\252: LaserWriter 8 8.3.3)", so it doesn't appear to be made with LaTeX.

I'm not a designer but I know designer friends using QuarkXPress around that time, and it is my understanding that you'd create the layout largely via the QuarkXPress GUI and also much manual tweaking, so the layout was probably confined to the company producing this document.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#16

Post by 535188B17C93743 »

durnygbur wrote: post #13

These hints reminded me that we don't have "great scientists" anymore. Can you list recent Nobel Prize laureates? Great scientists were basically people-institutions and all the mundane and scrupulous work was done by assistants, doctoral candidates, technicians, as we have an example of Hilbert and some much less known mathematician. There still exist relicts of this system in the academia. With increasing emancipat…

We do have "pop scientists". While they're not all necessarily "groundbreaking" or "leading researchers", I wouldn't discount the impact of folks like Neil Degrasse Tyson, Michio Kaku, and Brian Greene.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#17

Post by ketzu »

mxschumacher wrote: post #5

I wonder how the "Publish the Same Result Several Times" recommendation ties into the "publish or perish"-mantra. I suspect that 1997 was a different time. Many academics have a super-human publication cadence, not so much because of all the new knowledge they've extracted from the universe but because they aggressively re-publish their existing results. Very low read- and citation counts are common implications. Fro…

Personally I interpreted the remark differently. But it also may depend on the field you are in.

First, publish the idea, the rough concept. You can get valueable feedback from this.

Second, publish an implementation of the idea and the evaluation thereof. This is the actual result.

Depending on limitations it can be worthwhile to publish an extended and revised version of the second one. You can go in excruciating detail on this and include unremarkable side results.

Depending on your field you might be limited to 8 pages for your second publication, which is often very limiting, or your third publication might be your thesis linking several results together.

Version control would be nice though. Especially when you notice errors yourself you would like to fix.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#19

Post by ctchocula »

Forge36 wrote: post #9
mxschumacher wrote: post #5

I wonder how the "Publish the Same Result Several Times" recommendation ties into the "publish or perish"-mantra. I suspect that 1997 was a different time. Many academics have a super-human publication cadence, not so much because of all the new knowledge they've extracted from the universe but because they aggressively re-publish their existing results. Very low read- and citation counts are common implications. Fro…

I think this was the version control when paper was big :) Over of the other points on the article was "lengthen your summary" which was to address that very low read count! I wonder if it's possible to make a "github of research" where articles are more publicly revised only showing the most recent (celebrating Theory 2.0! And 2.0.1 -fixed typos) I took the publish process to be: iterate on your thesis. I saw the pa…

arxiv.org lets you submit revisions to a paper you have previously submitted and putd the label v2, v3, etc. A lot of preprints will go up for physics and computer science papers, while medrxiv.org fills the same role for health sciences.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#20

Post by toyg »

535188B17C93743 wrote: post #16
durnygbur wrote: post #13

These hints reminded me that we don't have "great scientists" anymore. Can you list recent Nobel Prize laureates? Great scientists were basically people-institutions and all the mundane and scrupulous work was done by assistants, doctoral candidates, technicians, as we have an example of Hilbert and some much less known mathematician. There still exist relicts of this system in the academia. With increasing emancipat…

We do have "pop scientists". While they're not all necessarily "groundbreaking" or "leading researchers", I wouldn't discount the impact of folks like Neil Degrasse Tyson, Michio Kaku, and Brian Greene.

In the UK, Brian Cox for physics/astronomy and David Attenborough in the natural sciences are likely responsible for enough recruitment that will probably lead to significant knowledge gains.
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