Good grief.
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Which journal?
I can’t say I’ve ever been asked to rate a paper in terms of its percentile rank. I would just refuse – I don’t think that’s going to yield a meaningful answer.
Unless the study has a pre-registered detailed analysis plan, the probability of reporting a chance result as significant (at a 5% threshold) is usually a good deal higher than 5%; there are just too many choices one can make in analyzing data.
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That is what I have experienced.
From the viewpoint of an editor, getting experienced reviewers became more and more difficult during the last 20+ years because experts are busy and reviewing a manuscript is not a merit that would be worth the time - many do it just as a tit-for-tat strategy or because someone they know asks and they are too polite to say no. A merited expert may get many requests to review within a week, so it is natural that they must learn to say no.
From the viewpoint of an author, non-native speakers have a disadvantage. Saying something so that it sounds convincing when in fact you do not have sufficient data to prove it is an art. You really have to be a skillful user of words in those cases. I have admired the skills of some professionals that came from Cambridge or Oxford. The presentations sounded really convincing but when you started to dig deeper, there were many logical gaps and weaknesses in the story. Those telling the story just had the skills to tell matters like they were proven facts, without lying at any point.
It also helps if others know you, for example many British scientists have different attitudes towards the work of those they know and those they do not know, especially if the person works in some other part of the world. A non-native English speaker working far has to have really strong evidence to convince the reviewers, a well known person that is skillful in the use of words may get a manuscript published in a top journal like Science without any statistical tests and the reader does not even notice that the claims have not been tested at all.
Academic world is not fully equal, some persons are more equal than others.
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As a philosophy undergrad the whole idea of pursuing a post graduate degree to get an article published in an academic journal was not appealing.
It’s kind of funny that I thought it’d be more interesting to try and change the mind of a single atheist on the internet.
The jury is still out on what was the more difficult task.
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Hi Paul,
Your comments above make me think of listening to the “News” or almost anyone with a hidden agenda. For instance, there is often more “spin” than substance in a lot we are presented with too much “smoke and mirrors.” We all need to be careful to find truth.
It is true that the Scientific Method should be a strong tool to scientifically evaluate discoveries, methods, and principles through predictable and reproducible processes which are always open-ended toward being invalidated.
We all should be leaning cautious in matters of significant bearing, and gracious all the time we can.
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It’s important to realise that “the News” isn’t science, and even popular science journalism often gets the science it’s reporting misleading if not wildly inaccurate.
Obligatory PhD comic:
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That is one thing that, fortunately, I don’t have to worry about, given that the popular press (and, for that matter, broader-interest science publications) ignore invertebrate paleo.
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I like Richard Feynman’s comment…“Science is about doubt, religion is about faith”. I would estimate that, in the 60 years that have passed since i passed my orals, I have said “I don’t believe that” about once a week. If you want some good reads on this subject, check out Pandora’s Laboratory by Paul Offit. Or, consider that in WWII, German nuclear weapons research stalled on ONE wrong cross section measurement. The US/British team were well aware that Werner Heisenberg was as smart as we were. But…with bad data…
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Paul, a few weeks back on the podcast, the interviewee described models and “more powerful models” as a preference for theories or laws (e.g. “The Law of Gravity.”) I appreciated the subtlety of nomenclature; it allows for a revisiting of all things science. In my own life, I’m getting better at revisiting all things: concepts or models in every area of my life, although many of the changes are more subtle or involve less swinging of the pendulum between extremes.(This easily applied to my faith life.) I love the term “cognitive dissonance.” That can be applied to the Scientific Method as to anything else. The SM also allows for the “fact” that, in our limited, human understanding of everything, we can’t see anything with absolute certainty. That applies to the SM, which will never achieve perfection in its process. I’m willing to live with the ambiguity, always trying, always questioning, always rejoicing in the journey itself, that there are (Rumsfeld) “known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns ahead.” I’ve let go of a metaphorical Rock of safety to let the Spirit of the river of life help me move forward. Jesus as a Rock is a metaphor that is limited (as are all metaphors) to an Aha moment of commitment; then we swim with him down the Spirit’s river and around the bend to who knows what. To me, that easily applies to the Scientific Method as well: a journey of discovery rather than the end the knowledge of God’s world.
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