5 ms·

Off topic, but on Friday the minister of Science and Higher Education in Norway had to step down, after someone found out about 22 % of her master thesis was pl

Off topic, but on Friday the minister of Science and Higher Education in Norway had to step down, after someone found out about 22 % of her master thesis was plagiarized. Why did someone look into this? Because she and her department is taking a case against a student to our highest court about "self plagiarism", which everyone thinks is unfair. So quite ironic she was the real plagiarist. And then media jumped on the wagon and started checking everyone. A second minister is now also in trouble after not only having plagiarized, but then invented source interviews (aka science fraud).

nefrix 3y ago
I thought this is happening only in Romania, but looks like is been a common practice for politicians all over.
- lr1970 3y ago
  Plagiarism is a form of lying. Politicians are liars. No surprise that plagiarism in political circles is rampant. Quite often such MS and PhD thesis are written by "ghost writers" for a fee. Politicians are busy advancing their political careers and a degree is needed just for its title not its content. PhD as a modern form of aristocratic title :-)
  - eesmith 3y ago
    This loses its sting after you realize all fiction is a form of lying. Dante did not, it turns out, actually visit hell. Or, "I'm Charlie Stross, and I tell lies for money. That is, I'm a science fiction writer" - https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-create-the-torment-nexus.html https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-cr...
- _0ffh 3y ago
  It seems nowadays a lot of politicians are effectively groomed for such a career from their teens when they see early success in some youth organisation. Sometimes a part of that process is to acquire some kind of academic background for them, justly earned or not. Ed. I checked and both Sandra Borch and Ingvild Kjerkol seem to have been active in party politics from an early age. Exactly fits the mold of groomed career politicians.
smeej 3y ago
I got accused of plagiarizing myself once, and I've never even figured out what that phrase means. Isn't the assumption supposed to be that anything I haven't cited is my idea? What does it matter if it's not the first time I had the idea? It's not less mine because I still have it. I could sort of understand if I had published it somewhere and somehow given rights to it to another party, but this was just some random college philosophy paper.
- toxik 3y ago
  You cannot copy from yourself. Reusing material and passing it off as new, no matter its author, is plagiarism.
  - malfist 3y ago
    I'm sorry but what? If I can't grant myself rights to my work, then who can?
    - vorticalbox 3y ago
      I believe the key point is > passing it off as new If you're not doing that then I would assume it's fine?
      - smeej 3y ago
        When did newness become part of the definition? It's not on the etymological history of the word. It's not in dictionary definitions of the word. Where is this coming from?
    - yrro 3y ago
      It's fine to re-use your own work as long as you cite. If you don't site then you're plagiarising yourself.
      - smeej 3y ago
        The default assumption is that everything I do not cite is my own. I'm the one doing the writing.
ZeroGravitas 3y ago
Is there documentation of this 22% figure? The implication is that it's large paragraphs of solid work stolen from a fellow researcher in the field. But it could just as easily mean 22% of her text was scattered with cliches, idioms and excerpts from legislation (or other standard texts) if someone with an agenda was interpreting the results.
- TomK32 3y ago
  You can have those 22%, no question, but then you have to cite the source which the minister apparently didn't.
  - ZeroGravitas 3y ago
    No, you don't need to cite cliches. Nor do you need to paraphrase legislation or other technical texts so obliquely that not a single phrase of it will be detected by a text matching algorithm. Nor do the tools have a human level understanding of what has or has not been cited properly.
- tkgally 3y ago
  Wikipedia has details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandra_Borch_and_Ingvild_Kjerkol_plagiarism_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandra_Borch_and_Ingvild_Kjerk...
  - 15457345234 3y ago
    Politics and Wikipedia don't mix The 'talk' page of that article is completely empty and not a single one of the citations is in English. For all intents and purposes you're taking everything written there on pure faith because the chance that some uninterested observer has double-checked all of those citations is basically zero.
matwood 3y ago
> So quite ironic she was the real plagiarist. "A man does not look behind the door unless he has stood there himself." - W.E.B. Du Bois
- mysterydip 3y ago
  aka "Takes one to know one"
- eesmith 3y ago
  The original attribution is not W.E.B. Du Bois as he was born February 23, 1868. The 1857 book "A polyglot of foreign proverbs : comprising French, Italian, German, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, and Danish, with English translations and a general index" has that quote in the index, on page 413 at https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/412/mode/2up?q=%22A+man+does+not+look+behind+the+door%22 https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/412/mode/2up?q=%2... . On page 354 you can see it's described as a Danish proverb, https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/354/mode/2up?q=door https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/354/mode/2up?q=do... : "Den leder ikke gierne bag Dören, som ei selv har staaet der. A man does not look behind the door unless he has stood there himself" That phrase is indeed in the 1850 book "Danske Ordsprog, Tankesprog og Riimsprog", p153, #2385 at https://archive.org/details/danskeordsprogt00copegoog/page/n221/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/danskeordsprogt00copegoog/page/n... . FWIW, the 1897 book "Men in epigram" attributes that quote to Henri Du Bois.
sesm 3y ago
Isn't it a common practice for one's Masters/PhD thesis to be a compilation of several articles that were published while working on the thesis?
- skywhopper 3y ago
  Depends on the school and program granting the PhD. There are various policies, and it’s a controversial subject overall.
- arnsholt 3y ago
  It is. In this case though, we're talking the wholesale lifting of entire passages of text from other people's theses. I think the tally is up to 22% currently of her thesis being copied without attribution from other sources.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
thiht 3y ago
Self plagiarism has to be the most stupid concept I’ve heard of.

nefrix 3y ago

I thought this is happening only in Romania, but looks like is been a common practice for politicians all over.

lr1970 3y ago
Plagiarism is a form of lying. Politicians are liars. No surprise that plagiarism in political circles is rampant. Quite often such MS and PhD thesis are written by "ghost writers" for a fee. Politicians are busy advancing their political careers and a degree is needed just for its title not its content. PhD as a modern form of aristocratic title :-)
- eesmith 3y ago
  This loses its sting after you realize all fiction is a form of lying. Dante did not, it turns out, actually visit hell. Or, "I'm Charlie Stross, and I tell lies for money. That is, I'm a science fiction writer" - https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-create-the-torment-nexus.html https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-cr...
_0ffh 3y ago
It seems nowadays a lot of politicians are effectively groomed for such a career from their teens when they see early success in some youth organisation. Sometimes a part of that process is to acquire some kind of academic background for them, justly earned or not. Ed. I checked and both Sandra Borch and Ingvild Kjerkol seem to have been active in party politics from an early age. Exactly fits the mold of groomed career politicians.

smeej 3y ago

I got accused of plagiarizing myself once, and I've never even figured out what that phrase means. Isn't the assumption supposed to be that anything I haven't cited is my idea? What does it matter if it's not the first time I had the idea? It's not less mine because I still have it. I could sort of understand if I had published it somewhere and somehow given rights to it to another party, but this was just some random college philosophy paper.

toxik 3y ago
You cannot copy from yourself. Reusing material and passing it off as new, no matter its author, is plagiarism.
- malfist 3y ago
  I'm sorry but what? If I can't grant myself rights to my work, then who can?
  - vorticalbox 3y ago
    I believe the key point is > passing it off as new If you're not doing that then I would assume it's fine?
    - smeej 3y ago
      When did newness become part of the definition? It's not on the etymological history of the word. It's not in dictionary definitions of the word. Where is this coming from?
  - yrro 3y ago
    It's fine to re-use your own work as long as you cite. If you don't site then you're plagiarising yourself.
    - smeej 3y ago
      The default assumption is that everything I do not cite is my own. I'm the one doing the writing.

ZeroGravitas 3y ago

Is there documentation of this 22% figure? The implication is that it's large paragraphs of solid work stolen from a fellow researcher in the field. But it could just as easily mean 22% of her text was scattered with cliches, idioms and excerpts from legislation (or other standard texts) if someone with an agenda was interpreting the results.

TomK32 3y ago
You can have those 22%, no question, but then you have to cite the source which the minister apparently didn't.
- ZeroGravitas 3y ago
  No, you don't need to cite cliches. Nor do you need to paraphrase legislation or other technical texts so obliquely that not a single phrase of it will be detected by a text matching algorithm. Nor do the tools have a human level understanding of what has or has not been cited properly.
tkgally 3y ago
Wikipedia has details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandra_Borch_and_Ingvild_Kjerkol_plagiarism_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandra_Borch_and_Ingvild_Kjerk...
- 15457345234 3y ago
  Politics and Wikipedia don't mix The 'talk' page of that article is completely empty and not a single one of the citations is in English. For all intents and purposes you're taking everything written there on pure faith because the chance that some uninterested observer has double-checked all of those citations is basically zero.

matwood 3y ago

> So quite ironic she was the real plagiarist. "A man does not look behind the door unless he has stood there himself." - W.E.B. Du Bois

mysterydip 3y ago
aka "Takes one to know one"
eesmith 3y ago
The original attribution is not W.E.B. Du Bois as he was born February 23, 1868. The 1857 book "A polyglot of foreign proverbs : comprising French, Italian, German, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, and Danish, with English translations and a general index" has that quote in the index, on page 413 at https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/412/mode/2up?q=%22A+man+does+not+look+behind+the+door%22 https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/412/mode/2up?q=%2... . On page 354 you can see it's described as a Danish proverb, https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/354/mode/2up?q=door https://archive.org/details/b24867664/page/354/mode/2up?q=do... : "Den leder ikke gierne bag Dören, som ei selv har staaet der. A man does not look behind the door unless he has stood there himself" That phrase is indeed in the 1850 book "Danske Ordsprog, Tankesprog og Riimsprog", p153, #2385 at https://archive.org/details/danskeordsprogt00copegoog/page/n221/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/danskeordsprogt00copegoog/page/n... . FWIW, the 1897 book "Men in epigram" attributes that quote to Henri Du Bois.

sesm 3y ago

Isn't it a common practice for one's Masters/PhD thesis to be a compilation of several articles that were published while working on the thesis?

skywhopper 3y ago
Depends on the school and program granting the PhD. There are various policies, and it’s a controversial subject overall.
arnsholt 3y ago
It is. In this case though, we're talking the wholesale lifting of entire passages of text from other people's theses. I think the tally is up to 22% currently of her thesis being copied without attribution from other sources.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

thiht 3y ago

Self plagiarism has to be the most stupid concept I’ve heard of.