Tag: Peer-Reviewed Literature

What makes a paper bad instead of just wrong

The editor of the journal Remote Sensing just resigned over the fact that his journal published a paper that should never have been published.  Real Climate explains what that means – being controversial or eventually shown wrong is *not* an indication that a paper shouldn’t have been published. This is what makes a paper bad:

But what makes a paper ‘bad’ though? It is certainly not a paper that simply comes to a conclusion that is controversial or that goes against the mainstream, and it isn’t that the paper’s conclusions are unethical or immoral. Instead, a ‘bad’ paper is one that fails to acknowledge or deal with prior work, or that makes substantive errors in the analysis, or that draws conclusions that do not logically follow from the results, or that fails to deal fairly with alternative explanations (or all of the above). Of course, papers can be mistaken or come to invalid conclusions for many innocent reasons and that doesn’t necessarily make them ‘bad’ in this sense.

Robert Burton on how to respond to reviewers

Apparently feelings about reviewers haven’t changed in almost 400 years:

Menac’d by critic with sour furrowed brow,
Momus or Zolius or Scotch Reviewer:
Ruffle your heckle, grin and growl and vow:
Ill-natured foes you thus will find the fewer.
When foul-mouth’d senseless railers cry thee down,
Reply not: fly, and show the rogues thy stern:
They are not worthy even of a frown:
Good taste and breeding they can never learn;
Or let them clamour, turn a callous ear,
As though in dread of some harsh donkey’s bray.

From the magnificent The Anatomy of Melancholy.

Predator X: Too Bad Ass for Peer-Review?

Predator X (Atlantic Productions publicity illustration)

Suffice it to say that earning the title Predator X should require a resume loaded with specific instances of statistically significant bad assery[1]. Big fangs or some kung fu lessons might get you Predator L or, even, E, but we are talking about Predator Freaking X here. By law, Predator X must be one bad mother. . .

Shut your mouth!
I’m talking ’bout Predator X.
Then we can dig it.

Predator X[2] was a pliosaur, a group of prehistoric marine reptiles (within the order plesiosauria) characterized by large body size, long heads, short necks, conical teeth, four flippers, and eating tasty things that had the misfortune to be smaller than them. Basically, pliosaurs were sea monsters, and sea monsters are already pretty bad ass.

Artist impression of the pliosaur Liopleurodon (by Nobu Tamura - CC 3.0)

Originally discovered in 2006, Predator X was the subject of a History channel documentary in 2009. Predator X was the subject of all manner of articles with the notable exception of the academic, peer-reviewed variety[3]. Hmmm, the publicize before peer-review strategy sounds familiar to me.

What makes Predator X deserve all this attention? According to the team from the University of Oslo Natural History Museum Predator X stands out even in a clade of sea monsters:

Its anatomy, physiology and hunting strategy all point to it being the ultimate predator – the most dangerous creature to patrol the Earth’s oceans – quoted in New Scientist (link to original press release no longer available[4])

Wait, did I just say University of Oslo Natural History Museum? What does that remind me of? Continue reading “Predator X: Too Bad Ass for Peer-Review?”

What a real scientific discussion looks like

John Timmer on some climate change back-and-forth.

After reviewing debates over two papers published in American Geophysical Union journals,

These situations tell us a couple of valuable things about the current state of climate science. First of all, they make it obvious that papers that go against the consensus can still get published, even when they come from people who very notably fall outside the scientific community’s mainstream. And, in fact, the scientific community takes these things seriously—seriously enough to check the math and examine the data sources.
Continue reading “What a real scientific discussion looks like”

Bullet Health Hazard?

The difference between a great title and one that gets you ignored? In this case, six words – or one conditional phrase. Here is the title of the PLoS One article by Pain et al.:

Potential Hazard to Human Health from Exposure to Fragments of Lead Bullets and Shot

Continue reading “Bullet Health Hazard?”