text:
Why are language test scores requirements sometimes higher for undergraduate than graduate admission?
I’ve been searching for the graduate requirements of some university. As regards the language test scores, TOEFL>90 or IELTS>7 are necessary. However, I stumbled upon undergraduate requirements: TOEFL>100 (>25 each) or IELTS>7.5.
In my opinion, graduate studies are more complex thus require higher levels/skills, so what could be reasons that the graduate scores are lower than the undergraduate ones?

One possibility is that they are upgrading the requirements starting from the lower levels.

@user37208 that was my guess as well.

Another possibility is that the pool of good candidates is larger for the undergrads, and thus can be more picky.

In Undergraduate studies, the you need to have a large network. But, however the network is small in case of graduate studies. Plus the courses one study. This is just a guess.

Also, graduate applications are to a specific department, and are more closely vetted by the department.  The university is giving departments more discretion for those.

While I don't know what exactly went into these decision making processes, here are some relevant factors (some more likely than others):

As mentioned in the comments, undergraduates need to take a wide range of classes (e.g., gen eds) including classes which may involve a serious amount of reading, writing and/or verbal interactions.  So undergraduates need pretty well-rounded English skills.
For graduate studies, one can often get by with a much more narrow range of English proficiency depending on the field.  For instance, less language skills are needed to follow a mathematical lecture than one about politics.  My school has higher TOEFL requirements for certain graduate programs (e.g., business administration and political science) than the general grad college requirement.  A more flexible policy makes sense for grad programs.
While some grad students may have teaching duties, there can be separate English proficiency requirements for this.  My school does this, and international grad students just grade rather than teach until the English requirements are met.
By allowing grad programs lower standards of English, one can get a larger pool of international grad student applications.  (Both increasing the fees obtained and improving one's chances of getting academically stronger international grad students.  If we really want a specific student with poor TOEFL scores, we can petition the grad college to waive the language requirement for them, but if the student just looks at the online requirements, they may not apply in the first place.)
Having higher English requirements for undergrads may make a school seem more selective (this may be factored into college rankings, but the grad student requirements may not be).  Related to this, in the current age colleges are evaluated by student success rates (e.g., pass/fail,  retention and graduation rates).  Colleges may feel/have evidence that international students with lower TOEFL scores have lower success rates, and not want to take chances on them.
Higher TOEFL requirements may boost enrollments in the university's ESL program if there is one.

Or in the case of someone coming to do a graduate program in, say, German literature, their knowledge of English may be pretty irrelevant, so long as they can speak German (goes with your second point)


text:
Does writing matter a lot in research?
I am a PhD student (mid stage) and my work includes the use of mathematics. I try to learn as much as possible. I am facing a problem: I spent enough time on the mathematics required for my research, and according to my research supervisor I am good at understanding proofs, theorems, etc. at an intuitive level, but in writing I still have some work to do. Many times I try to write things and, although I think I am not that so bad, there is still a problem to be resolved.
Question: Is writing in research so very important? I have seen some research papers of some star people whose writing does seems to be very impressive to me (although I may be wrong).
Edit: Please note that I don't consider myself a star: that's why I am asking this question. I am trying my best to improve my writing skills and it has improved to some extent, but to me it appears that I may not get that much better at writing. Let me tell you a story: once during my PhD I worked with a professor other than my supervisor, and then we got some result so he ask me to write a paper. I took 4-5 days write a paper 8-9 pages long, then he told me that I wrote in a cryptic manner. (This happened in my first year.)

"Many times I try to scribe things where, although I think I am not that so bad, but still it seems a problem to me which should be resolved." This seems like a key point, but I don't understand, can you edit?

Is writing in research important? Yes. With that in mind, perhaps you have other questions?

If you can’t clearly convey your results and the impact of then, then your efforts are basically wasted...

@user2768 I have edited that sentence as I read the meaning; I'm hoping the OP can make further changes if appropriate.

Following @cactus_pardner's edit, it seems that the OP is struggling to find problems with their own writing, hence, the OP doesn't know how to improve. If that is the case, then perhaps the OP can ask a question around that issue. There are many people here that can help on that topic. (Writing is incredibly difficult!)

How do you communicate what you have researched? By writing it down, so that others can read it. Therefore, writing and presenting are the most crucial parts of being an effective researcher. No ones benefits from a researcher who does great research, but is not able to explain his research to anyone else.

This older answer I gave in another thread may be useful. There are some references in it.

Effective communication skills are vitally important for any human endeavor involving more than just yourself working alone.

"I took 4-5 days write a paper 8-9 pages long, then he told me that I wrote in a cryptic manner." I don't really see what you want to say here but to me it seems you want to stress that although you wrote for such a long time it was seen as cryptic? I just want to comment on that because 4-5 days for a 8-9 pages paper is REALLY short and hardly anybody would create a proper scientific paper in that short time. Writing takes time and as other stated is definitely really important in any field of research. Good luck!

Because these don't seem to be mentioned elsewhere, here are a couple of well known treatments of mathematics writing: (1) How to Write Mathematics by Paul Halmos (1970; see this also); (2) Mathematical Writing by Donald E. Knuth and Tracy Larrabee and Paul M. Roberts (118 page summary/notes of a 1987 Stanford University course; errata and information about the notes)

@DaveLRenfro The first link doesn't exist anymore

@usernumber: Try this and this.

Writing matters a lot, and a lot of the time probably most PhDs (and even postdocs) face a steep learning curve. This curve is particularly bad in a field where writing is your tool, such as Philosophy. Even when analysis takes the form of symbols, in mathematics and logic, it is essential to convey your ideas clearly. Clarity is particularly problematic for young researchers, because of our tendency to hide behind pretension. Pretension, confusion, clunkiness must be removed for your ideas to come through.
Overcoming these issues is not essential to get an inexperienced researcher to approve of your work, but any researcher worth their salt will know when what you say is bullshit, or when what you say might have value but is unclear. I say this as an experienced, but not necessarily a good, writer. My writing has often been criticised and quite rightly too. I wish I had learned to write better earlier, is my point and the advice I give.
Because writing is important, there is a second question. How to focus on improving it?

Read good writing.
Read a book on good writing, I recommend Joshua Schimel's Writing Science.
Once you have written, wait, and then go back and read it. And then edit it. You will read it from the perspective of another person and hence realise why writing is so important and partly what you need to do to improve.

+1 from me because I think your writing/wording is very impressive.I can suggest an additional book: "On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction" from William Zinsser

+1 for 3) --- I think not enough people do this.  Many times after I reread a draft after letting it sit for a few weeks, I think: "What it the world what I trying to say?"  It's also a great way to catch errors.

Might be worth adding that many grad programs offer non-credit writing courses for native-English and English-as-an-additional-language speakers/writers. If it's a resource at the OP's institution it would be worth taking advantage of. My school offers an introductory course that essentially is based on your 3 suggestions. Plus it can be helpful to learn with others in a similar situation.

"Pretension, confusion, clunkiness". You forgot excessive wordiness.

Edited (re Najib). Obviously those other words mean different things.

Could you add a footnote to clarify what you mean by "steep learning curve", please? Do you mean they gather very much knowledge very quickly, or that they have to put a lot of effort into gathering the relevant knowledge?

I am using it in the common sense, i.e., something steep to climb and difficult to learn. The Y-axis would be the amount of effort you have put in, and the X-axis what you have learned.

I have not seen an answer mentioning the following aspect:
Writing grant proposals.
Being a mediocre article writer can be ok, you'll still get your publications, eventually, since mathematicians can get through bad writing with some effort. Or, they might not read your papers.
But, to stay in academia, you will eventually write research proposals, and explain your research ideas and previous results in a very clear, coherent and professional manner. This is a very fierce competition, and the audience is not experts in your field. Well, some are, and some are not, making the writing of research proposals very difficult, compared to writing a research article.
And  since grants eventually will pay your salary, I'd say, it's quite important.

This is somewhat field/location specific. If OP does Science, it’s applicable, if they do more “pure mathematics” or technical humanities (like technical work in philosophy), they might never write a grant proposal in their career.

@Dennis What would make you think mathematicians don’t need to write grant proposals? They do!!

@Dennis I do pure mathematics, and basically everyone I talk to in my profession does grant proposals. No grants usually means to money to do research, and you're stuck with teaching. Getting a pure teaching position still requires a solid research track record in Europe (the competition is fierce!).

@PerAlexandersson yea, I think that’s more the “location dependent” component. Europe seems more uniformly grant-driven, whereas teaching heavy jobs seem more common in the US.

Is writing in research so very important?

Yes.
Because you share your work with the world using some symbols. These symbols, might be the definition of a particular function as well as a collection of Latin letters to explain your findings.
No matter how impressive and groundbreaking your theorem is, it is not true until you prove it with a mathematical notation. If you think in a wider scale, no matter how good your research is, it is not complete unless you carefully and technically write it down.
To put it in different words, even if you discover teleportation, without technical writing and proper explanation, it is the same thing some random person claiming that they discovered time travel.
I would refer to this excellent and short guide to gain an insight about technical writing.

I'd pick on the wording "it is not true until you prove it with a mathematical notation" - what I think would be better to say is that nobody cares about your theorem until you communicate it to them. But that communication doesn't necessarily have to be in the form of mathematical notation. If you somehow discovered a theorem which is true and which you can explain perfectly well in words, that's fine. I wouldn't want anyone getting the impression that you have to arbitrarily introduce some mathematical symbols into the proof before it becomes valid.

@DavidZ You are right. That is a good observation

You should probably set aside a lot of time on projects for editing your writing. It is a skill that you get better at over time, especially with practice and coaching.
Why does writing matter? I've learned that writing is part of the thinking process. All of my education and work has been in my native language, but even so I found working with my university's writing center to be profoundly helpful. Often writing and editing helps you refine ideas as you go. It is while trying to explain or properly capture an idea that some of the limitations or gaps become apparent, such that you can acknowledge them and think of additional lines of argument or additional aspects of the problem.
I am guessing that few writing tutors will be able to help with the details of a mathematical proof, though they might be able to help make sure that the linear logic of an argument is apparent. ("What's your starting point? How are you defining Z? What's your next step? If the theorem requires that X and Y are satisfied, where do you address X, and where do you address Y?")
Can your professors tell you about the types of problems in your current writing? (E.g. confusing wording; ideas are too vague / not specific enough; logical jumps between steps; hard to follow the setup of the initial problem; not considering key cases; etc.) You may want to ask them if there is a class in writing proofs that you can take or audit, or if they have other resources to suggest. (Also, you say that you're using math; if your field does not have its own class in proofs, you may want to talk with the math department and arrange to attend the class they have that is meant to introduce undergraduates to proofs, even if the math content is review for you.)
Other advice:
Based on some of the words you selected in the question, I am guessing you do not natively speak English. (I edited the question to help make the grammar more standard.) So if your university has a writing center or writing tutors, or if you can get your more finalized work line-edited, you should take advantage of those resources. (For instance, you could hire a graduate student who is good at writing to edit your work (expect a few rounds--they'll have questions), or arrange a time swap so you can tutor a graduate student in a required math/stats class in exchange for editing help.)
Good luck!

Most of the answers assume it's about scientific writing, but not about writing down you proofs. (You have a bigger problem, if it's about the latter.)
While all stress that writing is important, and I agree, I'd like to put in my 2¢.

Writing can be learned. Look around for courses on scientific writing. There should be some. Attend them. Read other's papers, especially those praised for good writing. Read Strunk and White or Chicago manual of style or whatever.
You gradually get better over time. It should not be underestimated how much better at writing you get the longer you are doing your usual academic inner loop.
Remember your advisor with god-like writing skills, who basically rewrote your first paper from scratch and it got so much better? Now look up their CV and look how long they are in academia. When you'd be in academia for the same time, you'd be comparably good.

“Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who
  would like to seem profound to the crowd strive for obscurity.”  ----
  Nietzsche (1882) The Gay Science (The Joyful
  Wisdom),
  p. 173.

Even for mathematical research, good writing is crucial: Mathematical writing requires clear and simple presentation of results.  You should be aiming to make your writing as clear and simple as possible, so as not to obscure the mathematical insights in your work.  As with all academic writing, you should have a strong command of the English language (or whatever language you are writing in) and this should also be backed up with the ability to revise your notation and presentation of mathematical work to make it as simple as possible.
In mathematical research there is an additional aspect to your writing involving the presentation of mathematical results.  There are many stylistic choices that must be made in presenting theorems and other results (e.g., notational choices, use of intermediate functions, lemmas, theorems, etc.), and these make an enormous difference to how easy it is for your reader to follow what you have done.  Good mathematical writing requires you to present your results in a logical order, with clear notation of all objects, which is minimally taxing on the reader.  This often involves choices about whether it helps to define subsidiary notation for functions/objects you will use over and over again.  It also requires revising the presentation of results to get them to their simplest form.
If your work is being described as "cryptic" by other researchers, this is a sign that you are not succeeding in presenting your results in their most clear and simple form.  Practice simplifying your notation and presentation until others in your field are able to read and understand your arguments with ease.  Simplify, simplify, simplify!

It's important but not as important as others here are conveying. The notion of proxy judgements is pertinent; people don't judge you (your thoughts, personality), they judge what they can see.  Under this principle, badly formatted references and/or poor grammar could spell someone's doom.  But as anyone doing research in STEM knows, there are tons of papers out there that are so badly written that the proxy judgement principle would hardly seem to have any force.
My personal problem with scholarly articles is the tendency towards obfuscation - hiding the intuition of ideas behind unnecessarily complex phrasing (mathematical or otherwise).  Unfortunately this appears to be the norm with most such writings.
A way to make your research stand out would be to intentionally expose your ideas in very simple terms that (almost) anyone can understand and then slowly  introduce the formalisms.  If your ideas are good and you take this approach, you will stand out in a good light.
If your ideas are weak, then obfuscation and high prose will be essential.
Nice writing will still always be a plus, but its absence is not a show stopper.

Yes, writing matters a lot. There are many, many papers out there and every reader will be selective in what they read. Math is no exception, even there are two counterbalancing forces that make math special. Good writing matters less in mathematics because expertise is very narrow and someone interested in a very specific question might not have much choice in what papers to consult. Good writing matters more in mathematics because mathematical texts are incredibly dense and hard to read even when executed well. In some experimental sciences, it might be possible to ignore the lousy writing and just go to table 5 with the results; in math, this is not an option.
You write that it appears to you that you may not get much better at writing, but writing is learnable. A big problem with learning to write well is that good writing is invisible. It is possible to show off one's way with words and use clever turns of phrase every now and then, but good writing in an academic context usually means getting the message across with the least amount of struggle on the side of the reader. This requires making a lot of choices that you might not notice have been made. But one can learn what these choices are. Sadly, a lot of writing advice is really bad and comes from people with no linguistic background. Excellent books on writing by people with an academic background are The Sense of Style by Steven Pinker and Style by Joseph M. Williams (there exist several versions and editions of that book).
If you are struggling a lot with writing, academic phrasebooks might be useful. They will not turn you into a good writer, but allow you to be at least okayish. In the context of mathematics, there is the excellent Writing Mathematical Papers in English by Jerzy Trzeciak, which I would recommend even to people who write well.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

sort: votes


text:
Does equipment purchased with grants stay with the PI?
Similar to this question What happens to equipment purchased using a startup package after an academic leaves the university? , I was wondering what happens if the items are not part of a startup package, but instead from grants received.  Is there a universal rule or does this change between universities/countries?
I would like to know about all funding, but if it varies, let's say specifically an industry funded project.
I am not sure if this is relevant, but when receiving grants, I have been told if I were to leave the department, I would be able to transfer the grant to my new location (given the funder agrees).  This was, however, with the grant money itself, and nothing stated about after its completion.

Note that at least for federal funding agencies in the US, the institution, not the PI, is the official recipient of the grant.

@ff524 Interesting point, I updated the question to keep it answerable

It can get quite complex if multiple institutions are involved in the grant.

For simplicity, lets assume one institute.  I just made the reference to transferring funds since it seems like if that is possible, the grant is not solely belonging to the university, but not sure it is relevant after the fact

The fate of equipment purchased with research funds generally follows one of three trajectories:

Small common equipment below a certain threshold of cost is typically categorized as something like "office/lab supplies" and is effectively treated as part of the overhead costs of doing research.  Different organizations have different ways of categorizing and budgeting such equipment, but it generally includes things like laptops, pipettes, staplers, etc.  These items will be owned by the research organization, but below some threshold they are ignored and treated as being owned by individual researchers (they care about your pipette, but nobody's going to track your pencils).
Specialized and/or costly equipment typically belongs to the funder of the project, unless specified otherwise as part of the contract.  For example, the US government almost always retains ownership of equipment purchased using research contract funds.  After a research contract ends, one of two things happens with such equipment:
A. The equipment remains in the hands of the organization, either rolled over into use by another contract or simply ignored and abandoned by the funder.  In my experience, this is by far the most common outcome with research equipment, since it is generally useless to others and/or difficult to transfer, and the funder is often not interested in holding it in inventory.
B. The funder requests that the equipment be shipped back to it.  This is most likely to happen when the funder is concerned about alternate uses that the equipment might be put to (e.g., supporting an industrial competitor) or is planning to give it to another organization.

One of the common frustrations is that it's often difficult to tell whether you're dealing with 2A or 2B, especially when dealing with the government, which may take years to get around to requesting something back.  In the meantime, the organization still needs to track and maintain custody as though expecting the funder to want the equipment back.
Now, in all cases, the PI does not own the equipment, but if it is worthwhile to transfer a piece of funder-owned equipment to a new organization, the funder may be quite willing to do so, just as they may be willing to transfer funds to follow the PI.

"One of the common frustrations is that it's often difficult to tell whether you're dealing with 2A or 2B" - it seems rather straightforward to add a clarifying statement in the initial funding confirmation, is that unusual in U.S. grants?

@O.R.Mapper It is frequently the case that the contract declares the intention to follow case 2B, but in practice follows 2A.

We buy $30+M computers with US NSF money, and UT explicitly gets title to the computers. NSF has figured out that having to get rid of equipment that it holds title to after a grant is over is a huge pain and appears to have shifted to giving title to the institution that gets the award.

@BillBarth That's excellent news --- in my experience so far, the DoD hasn't caught up to that yet.

@jakebeal, DoD contracting is different, universally.

I think wrt to computers, the system that costs megabucks today is junk in a few years.  But it remains on the books at the megabucks price and must be treated as if it were a megabucks asset.  Maybe its best use is as a doorstop but if you can't return it to the funding agency, you might be on the hook for the megabucks.

The answer will vary widely, but for most industry-funded projects in the U.S., the institution will be the official recipient, as ff524 says of government grants.  This is because the grantor can (probably) take a tax deduction if the grant goes to the institution.
The real answer will be in the grant document itself.

So there does not seem to be any difference between this case and a startup package from the linked question?

@user1938107: Right.  The equipment will (likely) belong to the university, and they'll (probably) treat it however they generally treat assets of that type.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
Are there any drawbacks in adding hyperlinks in PhD application email?
I'm writing an application email to a professor for a PhD program. One dilemma that I have is whether I should add hyperlinks and if there are any problems in doing that. Consider the imaginary paragraph below:

... and I currently work under supervision of professor
  Foobar in laboratory of blabla at
  University of ...

Is this a bad practice? Is there any chance that they neglect the convenience of a single click because of a the visual incoherency of the text?
P.S. Are still any email client that shows the actual url instead of hyperlink text?

@CharlesMorisset, Regarding your first point, what kind of emails do they use (this is not an attack, I'm genuinely curious to know!)

@Pouya Plaintext?

You can write out the URLs if you are sure they are helpful instead of making HTML anchor tags.

My personal remark:
I am not particularly fan of clicking all around links in an email I just got from a stranger, however natural and official looking it is.
From reader engagement point of view:
Links directly included to the text actually invite the reader to interrupt their reading and click and go to the website of another university, reading this and that there, instead of reading your mail! It is exactly you don't want, becasue you want her/him to stay and read your mail from start to end. If you really want to link, I would make a separate short paragraph at the end or in P.S., something like "for your convenience, here are links to blablabla". That way the reader easily can reach those websites, IF she/he chooses and AFTER she/he read your message.

I think I'd write it "straight," and give the links in a closing paragraph at the end.  That way, links don't distract from the point you're trying to make*, but you've still provided the information that may be wanted. I'd surely put the full URL, instead of a blind link.  So:
You can find Professor Foobar's page at www.school.edu/~foobar  The Blabla
laboratory maintains a page here: blabla.school.edu

* For an example if distracting links, see any Wikipedia page.  (It is getting better, though.)

There are a few holdouts who only read emails once they have been printed. With the advent of smart phones and the decline of lab or research area secretaries this number has gone down but there are still a few. I know of at least 2 in my area of research at my alma mater that still worked with only printouts and both were, if a bit stodgy when it came to fancy technologies like emails, were brilliant researchers.
For that somewhat silly reason I would definitely find a way to put URLs inline in any emails to professors you aren't familiar with. Something as simple as:
... and I currently work under supervision of professor
    Foobar([www.school.edu/~foobar][1]) in laboratory of
    blabla([www.school.edu/~blabla][1]) at University of ...


text:
When applying for a higher education job, do I need to list my bachelors?
If I did a bachelors a long time ago in an unrelated field and I am applying for a job that requires a PhD And a Master's should I put the bachelor's degree? Is it necessary?

Yes.  An academic CV should list every academic degree that you have earned.
If you don't list it, it will look as though you got a PhD without ever getting a bachelor's degree at all, which would be very strange and perhaps suspicious.

+1. Consider what the team reviewing your application would think if they didn't see a bachelor's degree...at the very best it would not negatively affect their decision (unlikely), while at the worst it makes it look like you have something to hide and severely impacts their decision (likely)

There are countries that didnt previously award bachelor's degrees. Most of my co workers have a Masters degree then doctoral degree but no bachelor's degree.

You not only should put in the bachelor's degree, in most cases you must do so. Many schools consider falsifying or submitting an incomplete record a form of fraud, and consider that sufficient grounds to terminate employment if it's discovered after the hiring process is complete.
The only exception I can think of is in situations where the information asked for specifically includes a statement such as "please list only your most recent degree" or something to that effect.

Thanks! If the committee is interested however would they not just request it? At this point my Bachelor's is not relevant and to get transcripts would be a nightmare. If I have two Master' s and a PhD in the field will they ask for bachelor's transcripts too??

In many cases, yes. They may ask for all of your transcripts, regardless of level.


text:
Is there an English Proficiency Test with lifetime validity?
IELTS and TOEFL are valid for a period of 2 years only.

Is there any English language proficiency test with a lifetime (or
more than 2 years) validity?
Which is the scope of the test, in terms of recognition for academic and visa purposes?

Is there a way to maintain English proficiency constant over a lifetime?

You might want to ask this question at http://languagelearning.stackexchange.com/

The results from a test administered in compliance with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) such as Cambridge English, which is an international standard for describing language ability, has no expiry date.
The CEFR describes language ability on a six-point scale, from A1 for beginners, up to C2 for those who have mastered a language. This makes it easy for anyone involved in language teaching and testing, such as teachers or learners, to see the level of different qualifications. It also means that employers and educational institutions can easily compare qualifications to other exams in their country.
Educational institutions across Europe typically use this test as a benchmark for non-native speakers. If another organisation requires a result for IELTS (or other) language tests, they may accept a CEFR certification in place of this - depending on the organisation and the country in question.
Once you have been certified at a CEFR level, certainly with lack of use your ability in that language will decline, but the certification never expires. It is also assumed that if one once reached a particular level, they can refresh their skill with some practice much more easily than when learning for the first time.
* I have no affiliation with Cambridge English.

If you obtain a degree from a country where English is the official language, then nobody will ask you for English proficiency tests in later applications. This is especially the case if you are applying for a postgraduate degree in North America or Europe.

Unfortunately no English test can claim lifetime validity. If one doesn't use a language, one's proficiency with it will go down over time. Two years is the limit IELTS and TOEFL use; beyond that, you need to demonstrate you still know the language well.
It's annoying because some people (like me) use English as their main language although they didn't grow up in an English-dominant country, and they still have to demonstrate that they know English well again and again, but c'est la vie.

I am not answering to the visa part of your question, however, as for educational purposes; the Cambridge tests are the ones which do not have any expiry date. IELTS and BULATS are exceptions in their system. The score you obtain shows your skills at the time you sit the exam. This link has valuable information on your question (link +)
However, even if you have those scores, some institutions may require the candidates to bring results no older than two years in order to be sure about the language skills of the candidates. Some other institutes may accept older scores if they see proof of studying or maintaining language skills, such as participating in classes, working in English speaking environments, receiving supporting letter from the employer indicating that the candidate has worked on English demanding projects, etc.
If you have doubt about which language test to sit, you would better to consult the institute to which you are applying.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Is it legal to withdraw a signed offer letter from grad school?
I am asking for my little cousin who is going to graduate school this year.
He has just signed an offer letter with school A, but just yesterday he got a better one from school B (may know school A quite well in the field). Is it legal for him to withdraw the signed letter from school A and attend school B, as long as he does it before the inter college deadline of April 15th? School A has also not yet issued any I-20 form to him (yes, we are international students).

The following answer only applies for graduate schools in the United States that are members of the Council of Graduate Schools, and have signed on to the CGS Resolution Regarding Graduate Scholars, Fellows, Trainees and Assistants. (Here is a list of these institutions.)
Furthermore, this agreement applies to offers of financial aid, not admission without aid. (Although many schools adopt a similar policy for offers of admission without aid.)
According to the Resolution:

In those instances in which a student accepts an offer before April 15, and subsequently desires to withdraw that acceptance, the student may submit in writing a resignation of the appointment at any time through April 15. However, an acceptance given or left in force after April 15 commits the student not to accept another offer without first obtaining a written release from the institution to which a commitment has been made.

So the answer is: he can withdraw (in writing) his acceptance of financial assistance offered by School A before April 15 (if School A has signed on to the Resolution).
However, for general reference: you should really refrain from accepting an offer until you hear back from all the schools you are seriously considering.

Thank you ff524. He has safely withdrew it last week, and received a super polite email from his previous soon-to-be PI.


text:
Postdoc using current university's letterhead for job application cover letter (academic/national lab jobs)?
I'm currently a (physics) postdoc at a university. I'm currently applying for academic jobs (tenure-track research professor and postdoc positions) as well as jobs in national labs.
Question(s): Do I need to use my current university's letterhead for my cover letters? If it is optional, is it somehow better to use the official letterhead?
Note: This is similar to the post here. That post was specifically for someone who is currently a lecturer at a university, and the answers ranged from absolutely yes to absolutely no (with no clear consensus). Therefore, I I want to know if any of the specifics in my situation make a difference for this question (e.g. field = physics; I'm currently a postdoc which is expected to only be temporary; does academic appointment vs national lab job have different expectations etc…).

It would be interesting if anyone here has recently been on a search committee, and could say what percentage of the applications received were on letterhead.

Need? No. I got a tenure track position from my postdoc without using letterhead.
It's definitely optional, but I'll leave the discussion of the merits of that option to others who have more insight from the other end of the process.

I personally dislike applicants who deliver very formal letters, research statements, motivation descriptions and so on. There are people within academe who share my opinion, so be cautious.
It will be perfectly clear from your application where and which your current professional assignment is. This is not a function of the letterhead.
The bottom line, do what you like and concentrate your application on your actual achievements.


text:
“Areas” vs. “Themes” in the classification of a university’s topics
I am applying for a university, and on their website they have divided topics in “Areas” and “Themes”. For example, Areas contains Information Systems and Computer Science and Themes contains Big Data and Cybersecurity.
As the heading says, what is the difference between areas and themes in this context? In my opinion, there is a great many that overlaps making the margins fuzzy between the terms.

What's your field?

Sounds like a a distinction that PR/Marketing people make to underline the interdisciplinarity of the university: while there are distinct "areas" (as in "faculties"), they share "themes" (stuff to work on), so they collaborate in an interdisciplinary way. For example, cybersecurity is a field of research that EE, CS, and sociology people can work on.

This is division happens in a single faculty.

I suppose this is more appropriate for English.SE. What do you think, @DCTLib?

@ÉbeIsaac I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. I think that jakebeal's answer is good and suggests that the words "areas" and "themes" are used in a very special meaning that seems to be specific to individual universities/department. In that case, it's not so much an question of English.

Many departments will organize themselves internally in multiple various different ways, base on how they've organized their program.  For example, where I went the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department was organized in at least the following (partially independent) ways:

Three different degree tracks (EE, CS, and EECS): which one you chose dictated your graduation requirements.
Seven focus areas (devices, signal processing, electrodynamics, AI, algorithms, systems, biomedical): these were used in organizing graduation requirements.
Several major "laboratories" comprising up to 100 faculty or more, which were primarily EECS but also overlapped with other departments: these were the primary organizations of research and graduate life (beyond one's own supervisor, of course)
A number of "themes" within the focus areas, that were used for determining aspects of Ph.D. qualification.

Other departments are likely to have similar degrees of intricacy, as the result of the evolution of complex negotiations between different people and organizations over many decades.  Moreover, they are likely to use the same words differently, because there are only so many ways to say things like "area" and "theme" and lots of different odd organizational specifics that one might be mapping them to.
In your own case, it sounds like the "areas" are more durable aspects of study, where the "themes" are current hot topics.  The only way to know for certain what they mean to that organization, however, is to read the university's documentation online (if they are well organized) or to contact the people there directly.

I don't know the department but I guess that:
Area is somewhat more stable while themes can change more quickly.
For example, big data may be a topic for up to another decade or two but computer science will stay for more than half a century.
Also, I would guess that people from different areas could work together on the same theme. I may also be that the department hires a new guy in some of their present area but this guy will add an additional research theme.

Though it does not seem to be the case in this specific context, a "Theme"-like structure sometimes exists to allow interdisciplinary research and study. Where I am, there is (for example) an environmental-science "theme" that pulls from several life-science departments across two colleges, as well as various social-science departments (for human involvement in the environment).


text:
Comparing results of the same survey administered to two different populations. How to call it?
For part of my master thesis, I need to conduct a survey targeting academic experts. After evaluating the outcome of the survey, I need to compare the outcome to the outcome of another finished thesis which uses questionnaire targeting practical personnel. Therefore by comparing these two outcomes, the difference or similarities between these two perspectives will be concluded.
Does this kind of method have an academic term?

This may be a better question for English.SE but I typically hear these referred to as correlation and variance analysis (specific terms vary based on method: mean correlation between groups, analysis of variance by question/question group, and the like)

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it's about social-science terminology, not academia

The terminology that I would recommend using to describe such a comparison depends on the goal and approach:

If there is a systematic collection and combination of datasets with the aim of increasing the statistical power of the studies, then it would typically be termed a meta-analysis.
Otherwise, there is nothing wrong with simply saying that you are comparing the two studies.


text:
Do medical doctors publish academic papers and write grant proposals?
I know that medical doctors affiliated with universities can teach at the medical schools as professors and write chapters in textbooks.  But do medical doctors with a university affiliation also have to publish academic papers and write successful grant proposals, in order to be promoted?

Yes. Medical schools generate large proportions of the grant funding at many major research universities. Most faculty (except possibly research-only faculty) in medical schools have an M.D. degree. Research expectations for clinical-only faculty are often meager but faculty that conduct research at major universities often need to PI large grants to receive tenure.


text:
What is the weight of GRE analytical-writing scores on math graduate-program admissions?
I'll be applying to math PhD programs at the end of this year. I’m practicing for the math subject test, lining up letters of recommendation, etc. Along those lines, I just took the GRE general test.
What I've learned from math professors at some of my target schools is that the quantitative portion of the general GRE can only hurt potential applicants. No one in a math graduate admissions role will be impressed with a perfect quant score but a low score will absolutely raise flags.   What I didn’t ask, and what I’m now curious about, is the effect of an average analytical-writing score on an application.
From what I understand, I wont be the biggest fish in any candidate pool. The upcoming GRE Math Subject test is extremely difficult and weighed heavily for a candidate like myself (not from a traditionally strong undergraduate math program). There will be applicants from better schools and applicants with better subject scores. If I expect to compete, it will be because my application successfully signals a strong candidacy for a teaching assistant role.
To that end, do admissions officers in math graduate programs ever look at analytical-writing scores? What is the difference, hypothetically, between a 4.0 and a 5.0? I’m interested in analyzing the cost/benefit of retaking the GRE exclusively to improve my analytical-writing score.

I ran out of time and can likely improve (literally cut off mid-sentence, didn’t finish editing/deleting my outlined thoughts)
$200 is not a trivial cost but I would consider it given the possibility of a tangible benefit.
I’m not an international student.
I will have at least one submitted math publication by December.

Okay @user153812 I agree that the OP needs to specify the type of programs he is targeting.

I would vote no.

For what it's worth, a score of 4.0 is at the 59th percentile, while a score of 5.0 is at the 92nd percentile.

Don't sell yourself short on the subject area test. Yes, it will be very hard, but like you, I went to a school not highly rated (a liberal arts college). I did very well on the exam. The reason for this note, however, is that you should expect that some (many?) of the questions won't make any sense to you at all. The test has to be designed to cover questions from a huge variety of educational programs and none of them can cover everything. So, the test is intentionally broader than anyone's education. Do what you can do and don't worry about the rest.

Masters or PhD?

I think the entire GRE General carries very little weight overall in admissions nowadays, except for the caveat that extremely poor scores might hurt you, because it betrays a fundamental weakness in the application (usually that language skills aren’t up to par). But language abilities if you’re an international student are usually judged using the IELTS or TOEFL, so it wouldn’t likely matter unless the school imposes a floor on the Analytical Writing score.
In STEM fields in general, including math, I can’t really think of a scenario where a strong writing score will bump a candidate from rejection to acceptance in isolation.

It's been a long time since I was in the game, but I would think this varies too much from place to place to make such a general statement. It likely also depends on the state of the academic economy at the moment. Are schools, at that moment, looking for reasons to accept as many as possible or to reject as many as possible?

The significance of the GRE has declined sharply in recent years. For instance, the subject tests that were nearly ubiquitous a few years ago have now been pared down to just a small subset of topics. Some schools have even dropped the GRE as a requirement.

In my evaluation, an analytical writing score of 4.0 would be good for a foreign student from a non English speaking country.  An analytical score as low as 4.0 would be a black mark for a student from an English speaking country.

@BrianBorchers: Are there any circumstances under which the writing score would be the distinguishing factor to accept versus reject by itself?

If everything else was roughly equal,  then yes, I'd take the student with a 5.0 analytical writing score over the student with a 4.0 analytical writing score.  Writing does matter somewhat but it's certainly not the most important factor.

Do schools impose floors on the GRE AW score?

If they do, it’s generally only for international students to ensure English proficiency. It’s usually assumed you can speak and write in English if you attend a US undergraduate institution.

Math grad schools do not care about the GRE analytical writing score. Don't bother retaking the GRE general test to improve it.
Here's my personal anecdote:
Way back when I was applying for grad school, my GRE analytical writing score was 3.5 -- that's pretty bad, it put me in the 23rd percentile. Yet I got accepted into pure math PhD programs at Chicago, and Cornell.

Did you ever address or justify that score during your application process?

I like to imagine that giving the zeitgeist of science communication and visualization, that a bit more emphasis would be paid towards the writing portion.
That being said, a general note about the GRE:
The issue with the general GRE is that it has a severe ceiling effect. For most computationally focused graduate students, having a 780+ on the GRE math is a norm. Most of these students slam right into the GRE's ceiling. That's why the subject specific test is important for assessing graduate student abilities. There is a much higher ceiling on gre math subject test and so this allows for a better distribution of scores for people in the far right hand side of the ability distribution.
Once you get to grad school in math, its more about hard work that brains. Even the most brilliant students can fail if they are not prepared for the rigor of graduate school and academia.


text:
Sharing reviewers’ comments with all reviewers when a manuscript is rejected?
Imagine the following, very common case: A manuscript was submitted to a journal. The editor sent it to two to three reviewers. The review forms are ready and sent back to the editor. The final decision is to reject the manuscript.
Now, what should the editor (or whoever is handling the review process for that specific manuscript) do next?
In my years as a reviewer for several journals, I found there are two policies:

The editor shares the decision letter (that includes the comments from all reviewers) with everyone (i.e., authors and reviewers).
The editor sends the decision letter to the authors only.

I can think of many reasons to support Policy 1, and can not think of any good reason for Policy 2 (except maybe an alleged confidentiality violation?).
Reasons why Policy 1 is the best option in my opinion:

It adds openness and transparency to the process (everyone sees all the comments – and their justification – not only from the reviewers but also from the editor).
Not only do authors learn from reviewers, but reviewers learn from each other. Win–win.
It is not uncommon that people send the same manuscript (many times disregarding reviewers’ comments) to the next journal, and also it is not uncommon that the same reviewer has to review the same manuscript. In these particular cases, a reviewer can also benefit from other reviewers’ comments in past submissions.

I checked the policies and FAQs, etc. of a number of major journals and publishers and did not find anything that explicitly says what they do. Also, many of them fail to follow Policy 1 in spite of repeatedly mentioning commitments to openness, transparency, and good practices in peer review. I find it a bit surprising that I didn’t find anything on this, so I assume I am not searching in the appropriate places or something is escaping my understanding of openness and transparency.
Therefore I ask reviewers out there: What are the pros and cons of sharing the rest of reviewers when the manuscript is not accepted? The question applies to rejected manuscripts but also to cases of major revisions, etc. where the final outcome is still unclear.
Additionally, I wonder if other reviewers/editors have had this situation before and if you know of any official guidelines and justification to follow either way.

I removed the initial constraint of this only being about rejections, as you later say that this is also for major revisions. I would have preferred the question to focus on one case, but since the existing answer addresses both, I consider this ship to have sailed.

In my experience as a reviewer I receive a letter reporting the editor's final decision - accept or reject - with a "thanks for your work". Sometimes that's a bcc of the letter to the author, which might contain some of the editor's reasons for rejection.
I have never seen other reviewers' comments. Not during the review process, nor after.
In answer to the OP's question, which is whether I should see those reviews, I think not.

As a counterpoint, I’d be hard-pressed to find a paper I’ve reviewed for which I didn’t see the reviews, either as soon as mine was in, or with the editor’s decision.

@Ethan Bolker would you mind elaborating on why you think you should not see the other reviewers' comments?

Yes, but...
Most reviewers are well-meaning, but sometimes things go wrong. Perhaps they fundamentally misunderstand the paper, or get hung up on some perceived issue that is tangential to the point of the paper. Sometimes they turn out to be lazy, rude, or just plain stupid.
So, one aspect of the editor's job is to act as a filter between authors and reviewers. Occasionally that might involve removing part of a review before the authors see it; more commonly, the decision letter might indicate that the authors do not need to put too much effort into addressing certain aspects of the review.
It would make the editor's job much harder if their critique of the reviews is then immediately sent back to the reviewer - who has probably done their best to be helpful, and invested several hours into trying to help the editor, for free. Apart from being offended, the reviewer may then feel compelled to try and engage the editor in further discussion about the issue to 'explain' their views.
OK, you say - let's give the editor two boxes to write in: they can give a general decision that is shared with everyone, and then a confidential set of comments that only go to the authors. But that just adds to the workload and complexity for everyone involved, for no obvious gain.
More generally, sharing the decision and reviews with the reviewers would almost certainly lead to some reviewers seeking to reopen the process: comments on the decision, criticism of points made in other reviews, suggestions that occurred to the reviewer having read the other reviews. Suppose the reviewer writes back and says "I've read the other reviews and changed my mind - I think you should've given them a chance to revise the paper" - now what does the editor do?
Finally, there is a benefit in maintaining the independence of the different reviewers. If all reviews are shared after the first-round decision, the reviewers' opinions will influence each other, potentially affecting how they react to any revised manuscript. Again, you can invent work-arounds - maybe reviews and decisions should only be shared following a final decision? - but again it's adding complexity for very limited benefit.

I am a surprised by the last paragraph. In all journals I ever reviewed for, reviewers get to see all reviews from previous rounds when reviewing a revision. I can see several points for this, in particular that reviewers can understand changes happening in response to another reviewer and that reviewers can evaluate reactions to other reviewers, for which nobody knows whether they will review again (when the review is solicited). Are there journals/fields that do not do this?

@Wrzlprmft I'm fairly sure that I've only ever seen the other reviews to the extent that they are quoted by the authors in their response letter. In any case, I think there is a difference between seeing them in conjunction with the authors' responses and revisions, and seeing them in isolation.

@avid I have never, ever witnessed any of the things you mention in your second to last paragraph. Also, even if that happened, why is that a problem? In the (very unlikely) case that a reviewer changes her/his mind due to other reviewers, I would say great! Science has just advanced and we're closer to a consensus. If most reviewers are convinced about something then the editor's work is even easier.


text:
Do I need to sit for TOEFL or SAT?
I'm actually an United States citizen who has been living and being educated in Malaysia.  So currently my family decided to send me back to the States to continue my future studies.  Some people told me that I need TOEFL/SAT results to prove my English but some of them said that I don't need it because I'm a citizen.  I'm kinda lost now...
What should I do to prepare myself before going there?

Read the application requirements for the schools where you want to apply.  They should explain what exams are required.

But my situation is kinda different... should I still refer to them because they might not being able to apply on my situation

@gsey No, really, read the applications requirements for the schools where you want to apply. If you read them and they don't cover your situation, ask the admissions department of the school. You are not the first non-resident US citizen to ever apply to a US university and, even if their written guidelines don't address your situation, they will certainly know how to handle it.

As Nate Eldredge already mentions in a comment, there will be a statement somewhere on the application page that specifies who needs to provide language scores as part of their application and who doesn't. Since schools receive large numbers of applications, there isn't really any leeway for special cases: Just follow the letter of the application requirements. If this requires that you to take the TOEFL or SAT, then that's what it is -- whether you think that's fair or necessary or required is a question that's entirely unimportant.

There is no general rule on it. Each university may have its own requirements. You need to follow admission requirements which are often clearly declared on the universities' website. Otherwise, send an email and ask admissions office about your specific condition.
However, depending on universities' policies, some candidates who have not lived in an English speaking country may not need to sit English tests. As an instance, if applicants have been studied in an institute in which the language of instruction is English or have worked in a company in which the main working language is English (such as international companies, foreign affairs/business/translations/education departments, etc.) for more than two years; these candidates usually do not need to sit any language tests. They need to prove this fact, like the language of instruction should be written in their graduation documents, their manager/ instructor/ supervisor should write a letter to the university and clearly declare that candidate have been working in an English environment, etc.
So, the point that you are a citizen of an English speaking country does not really mean that you do not need to sit any required tests. It is important that you have lived in a non-English speaking country. Language of instruction is very important. If you have studied in local schools and in Malaysian, you may need to prove that you have enough language skills by sitting a test.
Please also note that some programs require test scores of GRE/SAT etc as part of their assessment of all the candidates, even native English speakers. These tests are not language tests and mainly focus on assessing candidate's skills in mathematics, logical reasoning, etc. Sometimes candidates need to sit both a GRE/SAT test (depending on which program they are applying to: undergraduate or graduate degrees) as well as an English test and both are part of their admission documents.

If you are a native speaker, don't bother.  If you are not, do.
It is possible to not be a citizen and be a native speaker.  And vice versa.  Consider babies moved at 5 months.

Oh I see :) uhm may I know what's versa?

@gsey I think it was supposed to be "vice versa", not "via versa"

I would blame auto-correct but operator error is more likely root cause.

it's alright.  Thank you for the info. Btw, the last sentence you wrote, meaning ..? (sorry cause my English isn't that good)

"sorry cause my English isn't that good"  Thus you need to take the test.

Downvoted.  If the application instructions say you have to take it, then you have to take it, even if you are a native speaker.


text:
How can I find a link to Guardian's list of postgraduate open days for 2014-15?
The Guardian newspaper website has previously published a list of postgraduate open days at UK universities. However, I cannot see the list of postgraduate open days for 2014-15. Does anyone have the link please?

A little Googling found a Guardian article this summer that now points to a separately established website which seems to aim to be a long-term resource:  http://www.findamasters.com/opendays/


text:
How should I cite a conjecture to which no written record can be found?
Suppose that a famous mathematician E (long deceased) made a conjecture (C), but no written record of this can be found (either because none exists, or because it exists in a very obscure source). Then, a senior mathematician S, who knows for a fact that (C) was conjectured by E, tells another mathematician X about this problem, and indeed X manages to prove (C). Just to clarify: S is sure about the conjecture, but does not have a publicly available source for it.
This creates a problem: one of the reasons for X's interest in the problem was the question asked by E. Without context, the problem is still interesting, but less so, and it would be better to include a reference to the conjecture whenever communicating the result. Presumably, in verbal communication this is not a problem, since one can simply explain how things are. But what about publishing the result?
I see the following options. Which of these are most widely accepted? Is there any better alternative?

Not mention E at all, simply state the result as is.
Mention that (C) was conjectured by E but not make effort to justify this.
Mention that (C) was conjectured by E, try to use elaborately justify that.
Keep digging for a reference (the real question here is - for how long.).

The question is most natural in mathematics, but I suppose it makes some sense in other disciplines. Feel free to post non-mathematics based answers/comments.

How does S know that the conjecture was made by E?

If this make a difference, he saw it in print somewhere, but much search has not revealed a source, which might well be some obscure conference proceedings. My point is that he S is certain that E made the conjecture, and S can be relied upon.

Can you ask E to confirm that she conjectured it?  Or, if that is not possible (e.g. if E has "left" in the sense of Erdős), can you ask S to try to recall where/when the conjecture was made?

Unfortunately, E "left" quite some time ago. Of course, asking S is the natural thing to do. Unfortunately, he does not remember exactly, and couldn't find any reference when he tried (and it would be impolite to bother him more).

"E conjectured C. (S. Personal communication.)"  You've given credit where credit is due and cited your source.

Alternative: S (personal communication) reports a conjecture by E, stating that C holds.

"Which of these are most widely accepted?" sounds like you're asking a poll-type question, which is not quite kosher for this site.  I believe that the situation is sufficiently unusual that there is no "standard" answer.  Nevertheless I will say what I think.
First of all I want to express some skepticism of the premise that the information that Conjecture (C) was made by famous, long-deceased professor E is an important to the extent that the work of the paper would be less interesting without it.  If Conjecture (C) had been well known to the community and many other people had worked on it and/or written about it, then its provenance would be key information: those who knew about the conjecture would make a clear audience for the paper and would vouch for the prestige and value of the work.  But if no one  -- or almost no one -- except S has prior familiarity with Conjecture (C), then the information that it is due to professor E becomes more of a piece of trivia / personal motivation for professor X.  If the provenance of the conjecture had really been a key motivation for X, then one wonders why X did not verify this before working on the problem.
Second I want to say that I think you are using "knows for a fact" in a way different from the way I would use it.  If S is "sure" about the provenance of the conjecture because he saw it in print once but now cannot locate that printed source -- then actually he is not sure, I would say.  Often someone thinks they saw a certain piece of information in print, but when they go back to check it turns out they did not remember it accurately.  In fact probably every working academic has had this experience more than once.  I'm sure S is great, but "S says it, and S can be relied upon" is not really convincing to me no matter who S is.  In a professional context, the things that one is "sure" about should be verifiable: if E is a famous mathematician, then it should be possible to get a comprehensive list of their publications, and then with sufficient effort one can look through all of them, including "obscure conference proceedings".
The way I would handle the situation is by first corresponding with S and making sure that S is completely comfortable with being attributed the claim that Conjecture (C) was first made by E: if this gets published, then S may get asked some questions about this.  If they are not comfortable I would go with something more mild like mentioning S in the acknowledgments.  If on the other hand S really insists that Conjecture (C) is due to E, then that is what X knows and X can put that in the paper in that form, i.e., something like

Conjecture (C) was conveyed to me by S.  According to Professor S, the Conjecture was first made in a paper of E.  Unfortunately we have not been able to track down a reference."

I would also be prepared to get some questions about this from the editor or referee when you submit the paper.
Finally: have you asked about this on MathOverflow?  This would be a very appropriate question on that site: if the paper exists then someone ought to know how to find it, though you may not know nor even know how to find that person.  Even if the question does not get answered in this way, you (or X) can still point to it as proof of your due diligence in the matter.

A good answer.  It sounds from the question, though, as if the conjecture was unpublished. Perhaps it was mentioned in a talk which S attended and took notes.  Or maybe S is in possession of E's unpublished notes, and saw it there.  So it could be that evidence of the conjecture exists, but is not in the public record (and so nobody except S might be able to find it).

@Nate: What I got from the comments is that (S claims that) S found the conjecture in print.  If S learned about it in any other way then including that information in the paper would be a good idea.  To my mind, if you e.g. make a conjecture during a talk and then never include it in your (presumably copious) written work, then that says something about how serious you were.

Thank you for the answer. Just to clarify, in relation to the first point that you make: I do not mean a major conjecture whose importance is clear to any experts. I mean a (sort of) natural question about elementary objects. One that you ask because it is natural to ask, but do not expect very deep insight from it. In combinatorics/number theory there are quite a lot of those.

As for MathOverflow - I haven't tried that, but I will.

I agree with the part about the source of the conjecture not being important for the importance of the result (while it can certainly have a big impact on whether it feels like a worthwhile conjecture to work on). On a different note, I do know of at least one conjecture where as far as I know the only places it is in print is in papers dealing with special cases of it (not written by the conjecturer).

This is a very old question. I would like to add that in my experience, this is actually quite a common occurrence in mathematics, counter to the belief of the previous answer. It's not usually that Famous Mathematician E whispered their conjecture into the ear of Professor S in secret. Rather, that Famous Mathematician E (potentially in an informal context, perhaps not) made a conjecture, and that conjecture---now in a very modified form that fits modern notation and perhaps a more generalized conclusion than was originally postulated---is still referred to as the "E Conjecture" even though it's hard to find an original source (and that original source would not be helpful to the problem at hand).
The solution is simple: find another paper in the literature that names the explicit form of this conjecture (with the right assumptions, etc.) that you want to work with, and cite it as a conjecture in your paper, with something like "E Conjecture (as stated in [reference]).
Examples:
When writing something about the Sato-Tate conjecture, for instance, I was unable to find the original reference for the conjecture: as far as I understand, the conjecture was made by John Tate, to explain computational data recently found by Mikio Sato, about the distribution of Fourier coefficients of modular forms corresponding to non-CM elliptic curves. The statement was later expanded to correspond to all non-CM automorphic forms with trivial nebentypus, and was then proven in 2011. However, it is still referred to, even in the most generalized form, as the "Sato-Tate conjecture" in most of the literature. (even though it is not a conjecture anymore, and the now-proven statement is far more general than what Tate originally envisioned envisioned).
Similarly, suppose you're writing something about the Generalized Riemann Hypothesis for a specific class of L-function, say, Dirichlet L-functions, Rankin-Selberg L-functions, or Symmetric power L-functions; you're unlikely to find a single, first postulation of the conjecture as the "Generalized Riemann Hypothesis for ____ L-functions," even if it is commonly referred to as such in the literature.


text:
Copyright date or publication date, which one should I cite?
Can't believe I've got to the end of my PhD before asking this one! I want to cite a work whose copyright date is 1996 but whose first paperback edition (the one I'm referencing) is 1999. Which date is correct?

I have actually asked a librarian about this issue as it came up for me in the past.
She told me to cite the exact copy that I am reading. If what you are reading is the first paperback edition (usually the inside left initial pages will have information about this), then do cite that.

If I had a dollar for every time I had to correct what a university librarian told me about anything book or library related, I would ... have many dollars. Being a librarian doesn't necessarily mean they have great insight, unfortunately.

In this case, however, the librarian is correct. Cite the exact edition of the work you are actually reading with your own eyes.

@JeffE Depending on how "cite" is interpreted. Given the OP's question, I interpreted it as meaning 1999. But I think this is wrong, as indicated in my answer. If 1999 is not the intended interpretation, then this answer doesn't really answer the OP's question.

The purpose of giving details in the citation (rather than just saying "according to Joe Bloggs") is to allow other people to find the cited work. Year of publication is something that could plausibly help somebody find the work; copyright date is not, so cite the year of publication.

You should give the bibliographic information that the book gives you. Nothing more, nothing less. You should definitely cite the year that the publication itself puts as the year of publication (usually after a copyright symbol). Here I clearly disagree with the other answers given here. Here are a few reasons for this advice.
One, this will be the year that most, if not all, library databases will put down as the year of publication. You will confuse a lot of people if you put 1999 in your reference list when there is no 1999 entry for that book in the library catalogs.
Two, it is commonplace that the "year of publication" is different from the year it actually appeared. Sometimes journal articles from 2004 will often not appear until 2005, other times journals and publishers will deliberately back-date the publication by one year. I have books where the publication year is n, but everybody knows it actually appeared in n+1. It's not your job to be a bibliography detective and tell people when it really appeared. Your references should just say what the publication says.
Three, the reasons most paperback issues don't change the original year of publication is that the paperback copy is identical to the original hardbound copy. They are usually just photographic reprints. In many cases they won't even inform you when the reprint occurred - it'll just say something like "3rd reprint" or "3rd print". Again, you shouldn't be a detective and try to figure out when that reprint appeared, since it is of no relevance to the readers if the reprint is identical to the original.
So this is what you should do:
If the reprint/paperback issue gives the original year of publication, but also tells you something about it being a reprint, then add the information about the reprint as a note, e.g. Johnson, John. 1996. A book about nothing. Oxford University Press. 3rd reprint, 1999.
If you really care (like I do), get the original. I know most people don't bother, but I always do :)

Your advice is essentially the same as the others. Cite the information provided in the book.

@aeismail Except that all the others say you should cite the year of the paperback (1999), whereas I say you should cite the year of the original publication (1996) if that is given as the main publication year. And that was, after all, the OP's question.

Usually paperbacks do not cite a different date unless the content has changed and a new copyright has been secured.

@aeismail That's exactly what I said in my answer, too. But in some cases, the paperback will retain the original year of publication for copyright reasons, yet still mention the year of the reprint. The OP wondered what to do in those cases. And that's what my answer is mainly about.

APA 7th ed. says use both dates. 1996/1999.  Do this for works (same edition) that have been reprinted, republished, reissued, or translated. Check your style manual.
As you know, the purpose of the reference is to (1) credit the originator of the idea, and (2) provide enough information that readers can locate the source information. One of the reasons for including the date of the reprint you have is that if you reference page numbers in your work, they could be different in the paperback edition you have than in the original hardback printing.


text:
How should I deal with a professor whose weak language proficiency is disturbing our paper's writing quality?
I am a first year PhD Student, writing a conference paper with an Italian Professor, very senior and renowned in our field. Every commit he makes to the SVN is riddled with spelling and grammar errors. I have been fixing the errors and also trying to improve the expression but I have this impression he is not very happy about me doing it. (Maybe something to do with him having dozens of publications and me having a total of Zero)
On occasion, he actually reverted my changes to stick with his wrong or inferior-quality expression. How to deal with this? I would hate to see this paper go with an inferior quality language when I could have improved it.

Talk to him

Is the paper written in English? Is English your native language? Your question is very well-written but it doesn't read to me like a native English speaker wrote it. If it isn't, are you sure your grammar/phrasing (not spelling) improvements are correct? They may be correct but the professor still may feel that the meaning is changed after your improvements.

@mkennedy yes English is my native language

@F'x Yeah thats solves most problems, but that guy is ........ scary. That said, I only have a limited quota of interaction with him, and I would like to focus more on research during those calls. He is an external collaborator.

So if he's an external collaborator, could you ask someone from your lab (your supervisor, your professor) to help moderating the conflict? Also, did you establish a spoken out rule/strategy of when the language poslishing should take place? I've had writing collaborations where we said "this draft is not polished, but please do not waste time on fine-tuning the language while we're still shiftin around blocks of text". Did you offer him to look over the language? When you change text, do you ask for an explanation in case you hadn't understood what he wants to say?

You have better things to do like focusing on getting that PhD and the first paper. The guy is renowned as you so at this stage it doesn't matter for him that much. No editor is going to reject a paper you write with him because it had mistakes. At most people will say that the language should be improved etc.
Practical advise:

Don't piss the guy off its not worth it. Be more politically savvy.
I don't know your field but in some fields you have to write in a very specific manner and what might seem inferior quality to you might be the standard way to write in that field.
Only raise the issue if its a titanic of a mistake! Do it gracefully. Next time don't change it put a polite comment.

No editor is going to reject a paper you write with him because it had mistakes. — [raises hand] Wrong.  As a reviewer/editor, I expect paper from senior people to be more polished and more coherent.  I might let language issues slide from a graduate student, but from a senior professor?  Oh hell no.

That's harsh then! So you reject good papers that have grammatical/style problems knowing the guy is Italian? Well for what I know and have seen for a good piece of work (given that he is renowned) most editors will politely ask for a revision. Maybe not in your field...

In computer science, most publications are in conferences, which have tight reviewing schedules that don't allow for major revision and re-review.  And yes, I have rejected papers with good results because they were badly written.  Better results deserve better presentation.

This is heavily domain specific then. In my niche area (interface of systems engineering and policy) people don't care that much about conference papers (some even avoid writing them). There is more flexibility and most people will get away with it. I have seen it both on the engineering side and the social science side. However, people have completely different definitions of what is polished and coherent. In engineering decomposition and hierarchy is valued for deciphering complex issues and in policy any paper that has more than one level of sub-sectioning is seen as being fragmented.

In my undergrad course (being done online) the lecturers are saying that some students need to brush up on their spelling/grammar skills because the essay/report was riddled with mistakes. For some essays marks can be lost in this way.

Maybe an editor will not outright reject a paper, but a paper riddled with errors should be edited before it can be published.

@blackace: A paper riddled with grammatical mistakes is difficult to read. If a paper is poorly written, it doesn't matter if the author is a native English speaker or somebody who learned it last week. If the paper is to appear in an English-language "publication," then it should be written to the appropriate standards.

Who said I was defending bad grammar or style of writing? You are taking this out of the context. We all agree in principle.  What I am doing is providing advise to a first year Phd student to be careful with politics and power relations in academia. At his stage he should be occupied with actual research and not jeopardize his good relation with this renowned guy over some hypothetical dispute over grammatical issues. If the paper is good (at least in my field) editors will show some flexibility and the paper will not be rejected outright. The student should be careful, that what I'm saying.

If your relationship with a professor is actually threatened by correcting their spelling mistakes, don't walk.  Run.

"A paper riddled with grammatical mistakes is difficult to read" not only that, but I've seen manuscripts where I wasn't sure about the meaning of the sentences... Grammar and spelling are not only aesthetic, they carry meaning.

@JeffE its not so much about spellings. that is fairly simple to resolve even if a conflict arises. The problem areas are the sentences whose meaning is not clear (but very clear to him!), or word choices, where his language is correct but a better/easy/concise expression exists for the same thing.

@JeffE I have seen really nice people that have had quirks and irrational behaviors that you had to accept and work with. Sometimes one just needs to bite the bullet, be a bit more politically savvy and get a long! I know Profs at least in my former institution that had big egos (some for good reasons actually). Those people would not be happy if you kept correcting them again after they had reverted back their sentences to the original.

@cbeleites you are stating the obvious and I agree with it. This is more about the power relation of this guy with that collaborator rather than grammar and style.

@user5838 I think I know exactly what you are talking about and I am saying be careful and make sure you don't piss the guy off.

It is always better to be diplomatic in academia, especially when you are a first year graduate student, and your advisor is a well-known person. That is "never piss off your advisor".
He can do whatever he wants if you piss him off. After you work with a professor for 2-3 years, your will only have two reasonable options: (1) quit the program, or (2) suffer and somehow get the PhD. The other option is to switch advisor, but if you are in the middle of the program, that is almost a no-option. Note that, even if your advisor doesn't become angry when you point out language mistakes at the moment, he may choose to stay calm, and find a way to react to you in future. My high level point is: be diplomatic. That is how academia works. If you piss off your advisor, you are not going to succeed in getting a PhD or a good job after that.
Coming to your specific question, may be you should leverage the fact that your advisor is well-known. After you submit the article to a journal (they may see his name and may be they won't be harsh), the editors will likely ask for improvements to the language, and may be then you can tell your professor that you will handle improving the language/grammar. Then it will show up as "taking responsibility" and he will appreciate you.

I have learnt very fast not to be a perfectionist! So perhaps you can be less judgemental (not saying this in a bad way).
However, you still need to be rigorous and if there is something that is dramatically wrong, you can then discuss it with your professor.
Perhaps giving him two or three correction options may help. Let him choose which version he likes. In any case, you would be preparing the options, so whichever option he chooses will be ok for you.
As F'x said, talk to him.

Other answers assume that the professor is OP's advisor, which seems not to be the case. I would advise to avoid working with this guy in the future (if he's stubborn on such small matters, it's unlikely to end well), and if he was your advisor, the standard JeffE's response would apply: "Don't walk, run!"
I am somewhat appalled that most answers seem to recommend the "play safe, don't mess with powerful people" approach. The language errors themselves might not seem like a big enough deal to pick up a fight, but by choosing to be "politically savvy" now you make it easier for yourself to compromise in the future on more serious matters. Yes, to fight over such issues requires lack of self-preservation instinct, but by choosing to do a PhD instead of an "honest job" you've already shown that's not a problem ;). Sorry if this is a bit off topic/argumentative, but I've seen this kind of answers also in other threads and I think the advice goes in exactly the wrong direction - there is a lot of excellent jobs outside academia, so contrary to other answers in this thread you are actually full of options (being smart enought to be doing a PhD gives you a very strong hand).

I am seeing him as someone the student can work with and get extra results, connections, papers, recommendation letter etc. This guy can be helpful to him and it doesn't make sense to piss him off for this sort of an issue. What you are suggesting as an alternative is nice talk but doesn't work. Academia is a place of complex power dynamics and egos and full of smart people that play games. Being appalled is not going to help you navigate the space, understanding why it is the way that it is and being politically savvy is going to help. You are brilliant and later you change the institution...

I totally agree with @blackace. If you really want a PhD, then you need to play safe in academia. Unfortunately that is how it works and everyone doing a PhD learn it at some point during their PhD, and unfortunately most of them learn it the hard way!

@anonymous +1 for the hard way! We all started with these romantic notions! after a couple of brick walls you start getting it for sure!

@CharlesMorisset respect is one thing. But we are talking about the case of an asymmetric power (e.g. student-advisor). From the perspective of an advisor or a professor, he will not immediately face consequences if he pisses off a student. But if a student pisses off a professor, the student may have to face a lot of difficulties. The student may stop getting funded, the student may be put on probation, fox example. So from the student's perspective it is better to think 10 times before they say anything to their advisors.

I'm also a first year, non-native English speaker PhD, but I've been doing some writing with my Master thesis adviser (native speaker of my language, not English, but very well versed in English and ~2 more languages). In any language, I often have long causal (is that the right word?) sentences, and he sometimes wouldn't agree with my style.
Even though I was the one doing most of the writing, I still feel like I can offer some useful tips. And, before the list, I support everyone arguing strategy and being careful that your actions aren't misinterpreted as disrespectful

if it's just typos (spelling), or obvious grammar ("It's advantage" vs. "Its advantage"), just correct it on your own and accompany it with an SVN comment ("Ran text through spellchecker", "Spotted and corrected few minor spelling mistakes")
If you feel like your professor has an easily-bruised ego, make it sound like not a big deal. Just some routine check-ups and tune-ups you did, nothing major you changed.
request in person meetings, or (in case it's not possible to meet in person) video-conference/phone-call meetings or at least ask the guy (nicely!) if it would be okay to collect and send your opinions and confusions on the paper via e-mail once or twice a month or so
keep track of passages and expressions that you would change. Rank them if you want, from the ones that are just plain confusing you and which you can not understand, to the ones that sound strange language-wise to the ones you just think you have a better expression for.
If you sit on that information for a few days, you'll come to terms with some of them, realize that some are really a matter of personal style, and which parts are just simply confusingly written and hard to understand.
communicate with the professor, respectfully and diplomatically expressing your concerns. Some suggestions that I would feel comfortable with.
"I'm not sure if I understood what you meant in this passage here (...). I have interpreted it as (...), is that correct?" (slip your suggestion here)
"As a non-native English speaker, I am not too familiar with this expression or weather it can be used in this context. Do you think it would be a good idea if we / I checked for an alternate expression?"
"I had a very hard time to understand this part (...). After going through it and understanding it, I have re-written it in a way that sounds clearer for me. Would you have time to go through this and offer your opinion?"
"Would you mind interpreting this couple of sentences for me? I do understand the gist of it from my practical work, but I can't seem to put the pieces in place after reading it."
this way, you're not imposing your style or writing, and it can not be misinterpreted as "I think my writing is better than yours." But, as papers are written to be understood by others, you expressing your concerns might prompt him to re-think the part of the text.
If he tries to explain on the spot, and looses himself in the explanation, that should be a clear hint even to the professor that it's not really clearly written.
There is no chance of you changing the meaning of something you misunderstood. Also, you showed that even though you would write something differently, you respect his style, reasoning and opinion. My ex-supervisor always told me, it's always okay to have an opinion of your own if you can back it up and defend it. If you can both concisely explain to each other how and why you've written a portion of text, it will be easier to reach an understanding.
always offer him the chance to do it ("we might" -- it means you) but say that you can implement the changes yourself ("or I can write the potential changes" -- it means you again).
Offering them to do it shows respect of their opinion, and offering to do it yourself shows commitment and respect of their time. Very diplomatic :)
never say you think there is a problem. Saying you have a "problem" is a sign of weakness in academia - so you definetely shouldn't accuse a professor of having one. Look through my post, go ahead: I never used the word "problem" before this paragraph. Not once.

So, shortly, I strongly advise diplomacy. But also, talking to your supervisor. If you offer your suggestions in a way that tell your professor that you value what he's written, his opinion, and his work, he shouldn't have problems doing the same with you. And if he still does have a problem with it... Don't walk. Run! (by @JeffE)