Re: citation indices

Re: citation indices

[Jonathan_CHICHE_]

This remark is quite off-topic for this list, yet may be taken into
account by those members who want to take action about this ranking
issue.

The situation is somewhat similar within other fields of knowledge
and is not limited to science. Indeed, I attended a literature
colloquium a few weeks ago, during which there was a short talk
dealing with this topic.

The speaker, apparently reacting to a decision which applies to
European researchers in his field, described a society in which
researchers, in order to be well-ranked, would ask their relatives
and friends to click frantically on their names and articles in
Google, then pay people to do that fulltime to get higher ranks (in
developing countries to reduce the cost).

A reknown critic and professor, quite influential (at least here in
France), replied that it was perfectly justified to use ranking
methods because these had proved efficient in the field of "pure
sciences". (I do not remember the words she used.) Unfortunately, I
was too abashed to answer.

The reason why I am writing this is that I think researchers should
take interdisciplinary action, if any. Indeed, this issue is more
sociological or political than scientific, and therefore I am not
sure mathematicians have the power to address it on their own.

Regards,

Jonathan

Re: citation indices

[jim stasheff]

George,

I'vwe had a prompt reply from Ewing on the general issue
so far none from MR

will try again

jim
 Janelidze wrote:
> Dear Colleagues,
>
> The discussion on citation indices is interesting and important, but may I
> protest a bit?:
>
> Of course we all know that it does not make sense to judge mathematicians by
> numbers of publications and/or citations. But it does not mean that the
> number (and the list) of citations on your and my papers given in
> Mathematical Reviews should be
>
> the number (and the list) of citations in non-category-theory journals!
>
> Therefore the task number one here is not to argue about general
> improvements of various indices, but to convince Mathematical Reviews to
> include TAC, Cahiers, and APCS in what Mathematical Reviews calls "Reference
> List Journals". Jim, any success?
>
> If it is as bad as Michael Barr says, well, it least we will know that we
> made an attempt - and then, who knows, may be Categorical Reviews will be
> created one day...
>
> Next, if you allow me to propose task number two, it could be to try again
> (using MR) to include the same journals to various lists including
> Thompson's list (APCS is already there though) - not because it will help us
> to judge ourselves and each other, but simply because there are those funny
> bureaucratic requirements of many universities in many countries.
>
> George Janelidze
>
>

Re: citation indices

[George Janelidze]

Dear Colleagues,

The discussion on citation indices is interesting and important, but may I
protest a bit?:

Of course we all know that it does not make sense to judge mathematicians by
numbers of publications and/or citations. But it does not mean that the
number (and the list) of citations on your and my papers given in
Mathematical Reviews should be

the number (and the list) of citations in non-category-theory journals!

Therefore the task number one here is not to argue about general
improvements of various indices, but to convince Mathematical Reviews to
include TAC, Cahiers, and APCS in what Mathematical Reviews calls "Reference
List Journals". Jim, any success?

If it is as bad as Michael Barr says, well, it least we will know that we
made an attempt - and then, who knows, may be Categorical Reviews will be
created one day...

Next, if you allow me to propose task number two, it could be to try again
(using MR) to include the same journals to various lists including
Thompson's list (APCS is already there though) - not because it will help us
to judge ourselves and each other, but simply because there are those funny
bureaucratic requirements of many universities in many countries.

George Janelidze