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That’s how it used to be. The reason behind the shift is the rapid increase in the amount of research output in the past decades. The reason that “arXiv + quali

by jhrmnn 5y ago

That’s how it used to be. The reason behind the shift is the rapid increase in the amount of research output in the past decades. The reason that “arXiv + quality check” won’t work is that the amount of research funding and permanent positions (related) did not increase accordingly. (Think of all the people producing science for low wages as Phds and postdocs and then quitting.) Right now the burden of the (unfair?) selection is mostly on the publishers and their prestigious journals/conferences, which then funding agencies/institutions take into account when funding research/hiring people. If we switch “arXiv + quality check”, that burden will just move to the funding agencies/institutions, but it won’t solve the underlying fundamental problem.

unishark 5y ago
In the US, both academic hiring and proposal reviews are already laborious jobs where committee members are supposed to investigate the candidate/proposal deeply on their merits and potential. It shouldn't be a new burden for them to be unable to take shortcuts. I think the recent wave of low-impact submissions and co-authorship rings is the result of developing countries trying to simplify that process and tying hiring/promotion/pay directly to publication count and related easy metrics.
- jhrmnn 5y ago
  Are supposed to, but doing that would require so much more work than is usually being put into it now. Especially in the first rounds, it would be impossible to review all candidates/proposals thoroughly without having staff dedicated to just that. (IMO institutions should have such highly-skilled staff.) It may be true that the SNR in research output from developing countries is lower, but there is still lots of good science. But essentially no publishers with good reputation. So even with the same SNR, the increased pool of countries producing science would add to the publication pressure.

by jhrmnn 5y ago

unishark 5y ago

In the US, both academic hiring and proposal reviews are already laborious jobs where committee members are supposed to investigate the candidate/proposal deeply on their merits and potential. It shouldn't be a new burden for them to be unable to take shortcuts. I think the recent wave of low-impact submissions and co-authorship rings is the result of developing countries trying to simplify that process and tying hiring/promotion/pay directly to publication count and related easy metrics.

jhrmnn 5y ago
Are supposed to, but doing that would require so much more work than is usually being put into it now. Especially in the first rounds, it would be impossible to review all candidates/proposals thoroughly without having staff dedicated to just that. (IMO institutions should have such highly-skilled staff.) It may be true that the SNR in research output from developing countries is lower, but there is still lots of good science. But essentially no publishers with good reputation. So even with the same SNR, the increased pool of countries producing science would add to the publication pressure.