text:
Authorship issue between two PhD students
I have a little dispute over co-authorship on a paper, and I would appreciate feedback on whether I am handling this appropriately (or if I am being an asshole or not).
I am a PhD student in applied mathematics, focusing on theoretical and methodological statistics. About a year and a half ago, I initiated a collaborative project with another PhD student from a different city. Our agreement was that I would handle the theoretical aspects (proofs and writing) while he would develop and code the algorithm. We agreed that I would be the first author.
I finished my part almost a year ago. Then he started working on his part. It took him almost a year and he did...something. But, in my opinion, it was not good. The algorithm he developed only worked under extremely restrictive assumptions that were not necessary and did not follow from the theory. I also had concerns that its occasional success might be coincidental as I more and more think the underlying idea does not make much sense.
So I looked into the 'algorithm' part myself in April. In April (took me about three weeks), I created a new algorithm and finished coding it (a completely different approach than his, no parts of his work used). It works provably better with no strong assumptions, and (yes, this is just my opinion and intuition) it beautifully matches the theory, and it makes sense that it works.
So I wrote it down in the manuscript what I did and I finalized the paper in the last few weeks, which does not include any of his contributions. Upon discussing authorship, my collaborator insists he should be a coauthor, arguing that this was a joint project from the start and he invested considerable time in it. I disagree, as I have spent immensely more time on it and all current ideas, code, and writing are mine.
We have scheduled a meeting with our PhD supervisors next week to discuss this issue. Am I justified in requesting his removal from the paper? I do not want to have bad reputation and bad personal relations with them, however I wouldn't feel comfortable with sharing credit for something that I created.
Note: There is something that I did wrong about this collaboration. I did not communicate well with him about how and what I was doing in the last month. I told him that I had another approach for the algorithm part, and when I finished the algorithm, I explained it to him (not in deep detail), and we both agreed that it was a better algorithm. Then we did not communicate for the last few weeks while I finished the rest (and yes, his part) of the paper. My rationale was that I did not see how he could help and I wanted to expedite the project's completion, especially since it always took him a long time to do stuff and I just wanted to have this project done and finished.
I appreciate any insights or advice you can provide on this matter. Note that this is just my point of view of the story, and maybe he sees it differently.

https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com/

Offering co-authorship with you doing the writing is wrong (and many journals forbid it). And if the other student has provided input to the article, it should be acknowledged by co-authorship; if it's only code it should be in the acknowledgements (and I say this as someone in computer science).

I tend to agree with the general sentiment that you should retain the other party as a co-author. They did do work (which you could view as an experiment that didn't produce useful results). You were aware of this, and did further work to improve it. So whilst you see the contribution as meaningless can you be 100% sure you'd have produced the exact same outcome if you'd done everything yourself from day 1 without seeing "how not to do it"? Include them and move on without them for your next paper.

@DavidWaterworth: I'd say: even if OP had produced the very same output on their own without any collaboration, the other's work has happened. As long as it was an intellectual contribution, they need to be in. Not as first author, and/or with the contributions section saying that they contributed a first version of code that was later given up in favor of OP's code.

Just a small word of caution: your code is probably right and functioning better, but, especially if you're coming from a theoretical background, just be aware of the many, many pitfalls that code can have (limited precision -> everything is discrete/ over/underflows, memory and computational constraints and bugs -> you think you know what it does but it doesn't). Maybe your code is perfectly fine, but maybe try to understand why he put in this constraints. My only additional advice: talk with him about your code, "use" him as your co-author (as many answers suggest to keep him).

I would say "Be generous and don't attach too much significance to the appearance (or lack thereof) of certain combinations of curved symbols (a.k.a. "letters") in the author line" to both of you. Neither has your co-author a real reason to insist on being there, nor have you a real reason to insist on removing a person whom you did work with from there. I often include all people with whom I communicated about the problem in any minimally meaningful way as co-authors and occasionally decline the co-authorship even if others think that I deserve it. IMHO, once the offer has been made, it should stand, so no one should try to force others out, but no one is obliged to accept the offer either, so everyone can opt out him/herself any time.
This attitude has brought me quite a lot of collaborators and good acquaintances (occasionally even friends). Trying to figure out who contributed exactly how much usually results in nothing but making enemies. Don't worry: you are pretty certain to make plenty of enemies during your lifetime no matter what, so there is no need to start right away. Also, I'll tell you one secret: the "collaboration of equals" is rather rare (though not entirely unheard of). In almost every team, one or two people are more equal than others and one or two (not necessarily the same ones) do a lion's share of work. Live and let live. Don't pick up collaborators with whom you have been unhappy about in the past again, but don't expect too much "fairness" when you start a new project (and be wary of people who hold such expectations in general).
As to "losing something by sharing (or diluting) the credit for the work", I wouldn't be afraid of that. During my 30+ year career, I published only 5 or 6 single author papers (out of nearly 200) and that didn't hurt my reputation in the slightest (or, at least, I have never noticed the harm). You've made the paper better by resetting and re-coding the algorithm? Great! Derive as much moral (or whatever) satisfaction from being stronger and smarter as you want, but do not kick the weaker person for not being capable to hold up with the demands of the project. Believe it or not, you'll find yourself in that position too now and then if you collaborate with really strong people (I definitely had such experiences myself).
Just my two cents :-)

This is the right answer: Build good karma, be known as a good collaborator.

That's very convincing as pragmatic personal advice, but, out of curiosity, do you think the system would work better if more people had that attitude? Since publications matter for jobs, one could argue that that generosity contributes to less qualified/upright people taking away the jobs from more qualified/upright people.

@Stefan The science is not about being at each other throats for surviving and finding the place under the Sun despite the fact that "the system", as it currently is, often gives such an impression. So, I don't know if it will work better if more people have such an attitude but I'm pretty sure that it will become less cruel towards both very strong and not so strong researchers if most people have it. Also I'm pretty sure that it has worked for me pretty well (even job-wise)  though, of course, I know of successful people who have exactly the opposite attitude.

It's not a zero sum game. And I'd say you have more to gain here than loose by sharing authorship. Especially as this person has provided effort here, the bad blood and reputation damage for doing otherwise will be pyrrhic at best.

@Stefan professors who are very cutthroat about sharing credit, tend to work by themselves a lot. Science is a mostly collaborative effort, with most research being the efforts of multiple people. A group of scientists who collaborate will publish more papers per person. And publish better papers than a person who flies solo.

@Questor: I wasn't arguing for being cutthroat. On the contrary, I was wondering if, in a system where number and quality of publications is the metric by which professional success is decided, refusing authorship where it is objectively not deserved ("communicated about the problem in any minimally meaningful way") is actually the altruistic thing to do.

From your own description, it sounds like you've tried to bully this coauthor off the project. By not giving them an opportunity to improve things you made decisions unilaterally to exclude them.
As part of a collaboration, you didn't have the right to make unilateral decisions to change the relative contribution to the project.
I think because of these actions you're kind of stuck. You had an ethical responsibility to give the collaborator an opportunity to contribute, and you didn't. Probably the simplest next step is to let them be an author. It is reasonable to have further expectations of them as a coauthor like assisting in any further preparation necessary for publication, you may have them review and give a third party look at the robustness of your code, etc. But, I don't think you can nudge them out by having just done their work for them.

I agree with this, except even this one-sided story doesn't read as "done their work for them", it reads like the other author explored one approach that turned out to be a dead end, and that discovery was directly precedent to the second, better version the collaboration developed (together! they discussed it!). He just is an inextricable author of this joint work and always has been.

You are first author either way. If you include him, you lose nothing and recognise the work that he put into it, even if it didn’t end up being the final version. If you exclude him, you gain nothing but a sense of validation, an enemy, and potentially a reputation for being untrustworthy.
This might be field dependent. I’m in a field that is sometimes over-generous with co-authorships; you are in a field in which sole authorship is more common. But from my perspective, there’s nothing to be gained by sticking to your guns on this.

Thanks for the answer. I only disagree with one thing - that I loose nothing when including him. This will be a paper in the best journal, and as a phd student having a single author paper in such a journal can be a big thing. It's quite unusual, even for postdocs. So it can put me in a better light when looking for postdoc. But I see your point, i don't want to be perceived as bad collaborator.

"If you exclude him, you gain nothing but a sense of validation, an enemy, and potentially a reputation for being untrustworthy." that's a very strong statement to make.  What if the other student truly did not do much and is being unreasonable in their demands to be an author? Also, this is very field dependent.  You acknowledge this, but you seem to can't help but be biased by the conventions in your own field.

@Albert Paradek Check with your supervisor whether you are correct that having a single author paper is a big deal in your field. In my field, first authorship is the thing: you don’t get more credit for a single author paper, even though it is unusual.

@Aqualone “What if the other student truly did not do much and is being unreasonable” — that doesn’t change the costs or the benefits.

I agree with fedja's approach, "once the offer has been made, it should stand". Yeah, you lose out (sharing authorship vs single), but probably not a great deal. It's irritating and rationale for better communication throughout the process, as you observed. I feel your pain as a grad student, working hard to develop a strong reputation in your field, and it sounds like you're in the right, but it's also important to develop a reputation as someone with whom it's desirable to collaborate...even if that collaboration isn't always perfectly equitable.

At my university during orientation they told us that even people you have a conversation with that just gave you an idea towards your paper need to be at least a last author, even if they didn't contribute any work. It's really about covering yourself, you don't want to get in trouble with the university for plagiarism. You read the other student's code and then built your code, and you claim that it's completely different but reading it might have given you ideas about how to approach the problem in a more general way but following a similar set of steps. I can't imagine that you were not at all, possibly subconsciously, influenced by it in your implementation. You might not even realize it, people's memories are often imperfect like this: you might read something and a few days later genuinely believe it was your own idea. So even if you may be justified in saying their implementation wasn't good enough quality, I would definitely not remove them from the paper entirely, maybe they shouldn't be coauthor but that is something you should discuss with both advisors and your school/department for policy.

I would use the CReDiT taxonomy to confirm contribution and then use that to discuss authorship.
It seems to me that you both worked collaboratively during the course of the project and probably the algorithm you developed benefited from discussions with this colleague. That ought to be recognised somehow alongside conceptualisation.

+1 This answer addresses an issue that other answers have not: the OP learned something from their collaborator's efforts, and what they learned led to a better paper.

One problem with this approach is that it sounds as though the OP didn’t really give the other student an opportunity to contribute to the writing. If someone who is supposed to be a collaborator hasn’t contributed much by the time it gets to writing up, you should always ask them if they still want to be involved and offer them a task in the final writing — even if it is only preparing figures, checking for updates in the existing literature, or writing a couple of key paragraphs of the introduction or discussion. If they say no, then they can be left off the author list in good conscience.

It's good that you have the meeting with both of your PhD supervisors. You should listen to them more than anyone here. That being said, here are my two cents.
I disagree with the other answer by Significance: it's not the case that you have nothing to lose: a single author paper can potentially carry much more weight on your CV than a two author paper. It varies a lot by field as to how much "credit" one gets for being on a paper with n authors. Sometimes it is almost independent of n, and sometimes it is more like 1/n.  In some fields, there can be a significant advantage for early career researchers to have single author papers, since it demonstrates their independence (this is partly true in theoretical physics, and I imagine this to be very true in mathematics).
From the way you have described the situation, it sounds like you should the sole author, and the other student would be only mentioned in the acknowledgements.  But as you admit, this is only your side of the story, and maybe the truth is somewhere in the middle.  I would advise you to really try to have a productive meeting with your PhD advisors to sort out the issue, and maybe to also ask the opinion of other senior researchers in your field.

I actually didn't know this until I started writing collaborative papers, but it's quite rare that all authors on a manuscript will have contributed exactly equal amounts.
My first collaboration paper had four authors, it was me and one of the other authors that contributed 80% of the content, the other two authors contributed 20% combined and that's being generous.

In my field, usually the first author contributed 80% and the other authors — whether there is only one other author or 10 — collectively contribute about 20%. It does vary though, sometimes the weighting is more even.

It depends on the scientific field. I think this could be the crux of your problem - in your field perhaps the authorship is more limited, in his (I assume he is CS, because he was coding) it is wider.
In any case I think there are 2 main points here:

"(co)authorship" in science may be much wider term that you are used to. In some fields, where data acquisition is extremely difficult, people who just acquire data are routinely co-authors. In your case, maybe the coding was also difficult part (which you then handled better than him), so there is possibility that it is expected that he is the coauthor. Discussions, ideas, this all may be worthy of an coautorship.
You made a mistake of not communicating with him earlier. Solving his part of work in parallel when he was still working on it, and then saying "my code is better" is absolutely the reason that any future co-authors will look at you with suspicion (this time it was programming, next time it could be data collection, validation, or whatever task you can do better than the coworker).

I'd say, he should be co-author.


text:
What should I do after finding out my published results were not substantial?
I am currently working (not in academia) after having graduated from college recently. I hope to apply to PhD programs at the end of the year.
I worked with a professor on a paper about a year ago and it got published in a top-5 AI conference. I was hoping to ask them to write my letter of recommendation when I apply for PhD programs. In fact, my first choice would be to work in their lab doing research similar to what I did with them earlier.
I wanted to explore the idea in my paper a little further and see if I could improve it on my own time. My paper presented a new AI algorithm to do a task that performed better than the baseline method. While doing this exploration, I realized that the results obtained in my paper with my novel algorithm could also be obtained with a slightly different, trivial baseline that behaves randomly. The baseline used in the paper behaved uniformly.
So, basically, my novel algorithm does just as well as a baseline method performing randomly. Nothing in the paper that got accepted to the conference is wrong, but it seems like the new algorithm I presented actually isn't all that effective.
What do I do? I'm obviously hesitant to tell the professor I worked with since they would be my strongest recommender and I want to work in their lab. I also know of other groups that want to use this algorithm. Should I tell them that they might as well use this random baseline?
Update: I ended up telling my advisor. They were super unfazed by the situation. Nothing in the paper was wrong, so we didn't update it. However, we put a note on our paper's website showing the results of follow-up experiments showing that the method does not outperform the random baseline. Still got a letter of rec and got into the PhD program in their department (the only one I got into LOL).

Thanks for the update!

If the results in the paper are correct, I don't see an issue here.
It sometimes happens that a simple algorithm can do the work of a previously known complicated approach.
If you can prove that the simple baseline method outperforms your previous complicated approach, then any reasonable researcher would see this as a net positive.
This is the point of research - you discover something, it works, then you continue exploring it and discover that something else works better. If I were the professor I would laud you for discovering a simpler approach to solve a problem!

If bigiftrue does prove this, how would you suggest they publish that result?

So a researcher publishes complex method A which outperforms trivial baseline 1. Then they write another paper that says their own complex method A is bad because it is outperformed by trivial baseline 2, which they probably should have tested before. Not only does this sequence make them look bad, by shooting down their own work, it can also invite accusations of salami slicing (real or not). They published two papers on something that doesn't work.

@user71659 you can always accuse someone of something. I could accuse op of having known the algorithm was "bad" and still having published it. Doesn't make it any more true, though.

(+1) You don't look bad by "shooting down your previous work" --- you look bad by clinging to wrong ideas out of pride or embarrassment.  I agree with Spark that both findings are laudable and both should be published.

No. OP had the wherewithal to do a basic (even trivial) sanity check which "the professor" either forgot to do (not speaking well for his competence) or just conveniently "forgot" to do (not speaking well for his ethics).

@wizzwizz4 I think that really depends on how interesting it is. It's a standalone result. I had instances where less than a year after we published a paper, we came up with a strictly better solution. I thought it was interesting so we published it as a standalone result. It's impossible to tell what's happening here without more info.

@Deipatrous why are you assuming bad behavior on the professor's side? A lot of results only seem obvious after the fact, and from it sounds like it's not an immediate check, but a modification of one. If baseline1 didn't outperform the Algorithm, why should we assume that baseline2 would?

@user71659 I disagree. A lot of results seem obvious after the fact. Perhaps baseline2 was good empirically, but actually proving that it outperforms the complex algorithm is really non-trivial (very common problem). This is worth knowing in itself, and will not be considered unethical.

If the original paper was strictly correct, then it should be left alone.
What I would do is continue to investigate your complex algorithm with an eye to determine when it outperforms your second randomized baseline.
Is there some specific type or subset of data where the complex algorithm outperforms baseline 2? What types of inputs break baseline 2, and how does your complex algorithm respond to those? Is there a modification to your algorithm that can make it beat baseline 2 in those cases?
If you can answer those questions, you can publish another paper saying that although simple baseline 2 beat your algorithm, it still works better in these cases or with these changes.
That way you're reporting on improvements and evolution of your algorithm. This is how many things work: AI and artificial neural networks were first proposed in the 1960's and they clearly didn't work very well until multiple decades of advances got them to where they are now.
You also want to report the work in this way to your professor. You can say that it appears our algorithm doesn't work well against baseline 2, but preliminary results show that these changes would fix the problem, and here's a plan for further investigation (if you hire me). That's very impressive as it shows the skills of independence, drive, and "stick-to-it-iveness" needed for a PhD.
Even if your complex algorithm is unsalvageable, you now have a new task: do better than baseline 2. Your next paper could be our complex algorithm A was defeated by baseline 2, but now complex algorithm B does much better than A and 2. If you keep going down paths like this, you now have a career in research.

I suspect some of the other answers are (over)generalizing from other fields.  In AI, publishing two papers on something that doesn't work is indeed unfortunate. All the worse if the baseline propagated by the second paper is something that you should have tried while writing the first paper. Fairly or not, publishing a second paper with the "trivial baseline that behaves randomly" is a little like saying "Breaking news: I just realized that the algorithm I was hocking last year, and some of you bought, is total snake oil!" Not a great look, even if you are acting in good faith.
I would consider posting an updated version of the paper on the arXiv. Not a  new paper, nor an erratum, but simply a new version with a brief new section showing the new results. You can then write to the other researchers who you know are using your method, and point them to this new version. This is probably the cleanest way to fulfill your ethical obligations while drawing minimal attention to this unfortunate incident.

I don't disagree with this answer, but the impact is not that bad as this answer paints, as OP's first paper had gone through peer review, and supposedly if the random baseline is that trivial it should have been caught there. And even if it's indeed trivial, OP shouldn't feel too bad because at least 3-4 other researchers also miss this (including OP's advisor, the 2-3 reviewers, possibly the area chairs, anyone OP consulted their paper with before publications, etc.).

If OP takes the suggested course of action, then I agree the impact is not so bad: OP still has a paper in a top journal, and the record is clear. But if they publish a second paper that essentially nullifies the first, this would be much more noticeable, and the time spent on the second paper would (presumably) impede more impactful work.

Yep. I guess it depends on how much value OP can get from realizing the existence of this random baseline. It might highlight something in the method that can be improved over this random baseline, in which case, it can produce more impactful work just as well.

Write a new paper showing this result
It sounds to me like you have a topic for a valuable new paper.  In your previous paper you showed that there is a novel method X that solves a problem better than existing method A.  In your next paper you can show that method X unfortunately does not perform better than existing method B, so it does not appear to be effective after all.  Both results are publishable and both advance the discipline.  Contrary to your question title, both results are still "substantial" --- they introduce a new method and show how it compares with various other methods.

Remember that your previous work was examined by peer researchers during the peer review, and if none of them suggested to try the random baseline you described here, then it means either this random baseline is not that common in your field (in which case your random baseline is a new contribution to the field, or at least to make it more known, so that other researchers will always think about using this strong baseline), or that probably it's common, but the reviewers also missed that (in which case, you shouldn't feel too bad, since it's not only you who missed this baseline).
At any case, one thing that you shouldn't do is to not mention this to your advisor. You should definitely mention this and discuss the implication. Sometimes, when a method that seems good gets outperformed by a simple baseline, it indicates that the thought process of coming up with the model might have something that needs fixing. And this may or may not spark new discussions and new models/algorithms.
I understand that having our work be defeated by a simple baseline feels devastating. We spent much of our time proudly working and proving and testing that method to work, and wouldn't like to see that the method is apparently not that good. But that's okay, we can treat this as getting new knowledge that perhaps our the mental model of how we approach the problem might be incomplete. We can think of this as a possible new direction where we might contribute to.
So, in terms of actions, the normal course of action would usually be:

Mention this random baseline with your advisor and discuss it
Think of another new method that improves over this random baseline
In the paper describing this newer method, also mention the fact that this baseline is quite strong and other researcher should use it. (or, if the task is kinda solved with this random baseline, then you've shown that it's not an interesting task, and maybe move on with other more interesting tasks)

Step 2 and 3 would probably be suggested by your advisor too after you do step 1. =)

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Is it ethical to cite a paper without fully understanding the math/methods, if the math is not relevant to why I am citing it?
I'm writing an article for a university assignment, and I am essentially looking for sources to support fairly surface level points. Two of the points I am searching for is evidence of diffusion models being used in the modern day, as well as how diffusion models work on a surface level.
To describe my question better, this is the paper I'm looking at in question: https://arxiv.org/abs/2209.00796
I can easily answer the above two points using the above paper. However, I cannot fully understand the equations in the paper, just the general gist of how the math works, enough to confidently know that I will not accidentally twist the authors' words.
Would it be ethical if I cited the paper?

Just to point out that if it were not ethical, most of pure mathematics would grind to a halt. If people were only ever able to cite results they understood how to prove, any difficult and deep result would gather almost no citations. I have not read most of the papers I cite (beyond the introduction, to know what is in them). There are not enough hours in the day.

I say absolutely, one can cite papers without fully understanding them.

Yes, it is ethical to cite the work of others when you don't completely understand it. You depend on the fact that it has been vetted by others; the reviewers who approved and possibly improved it.
But you put yourself at risk, also, by doing this. If it turns out that the original has errors that impact on your work then your work is called into question.
But some papers are correct in some ways but not in others. If you understand the parts you actually use, then you are pretty safe. But there isn't an ethical question in any case.
Note, however, that arXiv papers may not yet have much vetting, making it risky to depend on claims you don't understand. But if you use it, you have an ethical obligation to cite it.
Caveat: Knowingly reinforcing the work of cranks is a different matter. It is better for scholarship and the advance of knowledge if they aren't cited in a way implying acceptance of incorrect, especially damaging or dangerous, ideas. I doubt that is the issue here, however.

I appreciate your reply! What I can take away from this is that as long as I opt for a reputable source and only cite parts which I understand, I should be fairly safe?
In any case, thank you for taking the time to answer!!

You should check with your instructor to see whether they're willing to accept citations of ArXiv preprints or not.  They might want you to cite peer-reviewed published sources.

I think the important thing is that it must be peer-reviewed, and if you aren't confident in your grasp of the maths (etc.) you'd probably be wise to check that other authors that cite the paper are happy with it/

@BrianBorchers Thank you for the suggestion! I have indeed checked with my instructor and their requirements were 3 journal articles, other than that I can go ham with the rest of my sources, as long as they're "scholarly" in nature. But yea, I think that it's indeed good practice to check beforehand on what instructors expect, especially if I'm uncertain with assignment requirements :)

Not that I disagree with Buffy, just a general word of caution: Peer reviewers' approval definitely adds some security for you/gives credibility to the work, but is no guarantee. I once saw a reviewer report with a remark like "Of course I didn't check all the calculations." And of course there are instances where the reviewers don't have the faintest chance to check stuff, with simulation results, for example. But in that case, so do you... (reasonable effort assumed)

Buffy's answer and caution is on point. To add one thing: one way to mitigate the risks associated with the citation is by being very precise about the citation wording. What are you citing the paper for? Often it is a simple statement that you actually need, so you can simply state exactly that. For instance:

If the statement you need is "recently, researchers have investigated X", you can say that, and you will never be wrong :) This is very common in academic papers.

If you need the paper for a particular finding, you can say, e.g.: "In the context of ABC, researchers found that X have an impact on Y." This is also fairly safe: you caveat that the researchers found ABC, not that it is necessarily true.

Sometimes, you need a definitive and not qualitative statement: e.g., "we know that every Foo is a Bar, so we choose to implement only Bar..." Here you need to be really sure you are right and that your definitions match theirs.

Finally, even if you need something definitive, there are cases where you don't actually know for sure that it is true, and sometimes you can say this. For instance: "Recently, researchers found that the effect Y is primarily due to causes A and B, though we are not aware whether this finding was due to any extraneous factors." Hedging like this doesn't look great, but if it is really impossible for you to figure out something from the earlier paper, sometimes hedging is the safest and most honest thing to do.

What's more dangerous than any of the above scenarios is if you cite for a large body of an existing paper that you haven't read: e.g. copying results tables or calculated data. Here it is generally wise to exercise caution and just replicate the result(s) yourself.
In any case, if you say exactly what you know from the paper (and nothing else), then even if (worst case scenario) the paper is later turns out to be wrong for some reason or even retracted, you won't have to change your paper at all.

(+1) Nice examples! These are the kinds of things that would be useful regarding this question (see my comment there beginning with "My gut reaction is"), so I've left a comment there to see your answer here. Incidentally, a slightly less accusatory-sounding version of your example "Recently, researchers found that the effect Y is primarily due to causes A and B, though we are not aware whether ..." is "Recently, researchers have claimed that the effect Y is primarily due to causes A and B" (or "have argued that").

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


text:
Urgent Help: Company asked me for my research proposal
One of the companies I requested permission to recruit participants for my study is asking me to provide my research proposal. My question is, should I send the actual proposal (about 100 pages) or a summary? Is it ethical? Am I allowed to do that?
I cannot contact anyone from my school to ask these questions but until Monday. I really would like to reply to the company right away because I need the participants.
If I have to send a summary only, do you know if there is a format for that?
Your prompt assistance is appreciated!
CS

Explain why it may be a problem to reveal your proposal? Is the company a potential competitor? Is it so original that you fear a leak (if so, request a non-disclosure agreement)? Did your advisor ban you from forwarding the proposal (in which case you should ask them)? Normally, it is unlikely that revealing your proposal is a problem, but if you foresee danger,  answer above questions to yourself before proceeding. I do not see how it would be unethical (as long as the secrecy of distractions crucial for the experiment's success are not leaked by the company).

Thank you for the quick reply Captain Emacs. This is the first time I will be conducting a study and I was wondering if being asked to provide one's proposal was common.

I do not know whether it is common wherever you are - they may have real interest or they may want to protect themselves. But, really, the best way forward is to ask your advisor who will know the context.

If you are in a country where the university doesn't operate on weekends then I would guess businesses don't either (therefore it is expected to not reply until Monday).

I'm in the USA, but the company that answered me is from abroad and I've received their message this morning that's why I wanted to answer them today.

This is a sufficiently common request that I'm actually surprised that you didn't get it ahead of time. Breaking down your question:

My question is, should I send the actual proposal (about 100 pages) or a summary?

The actual proposal, with a summary in the front for the TL;DR crowd.

Is it ethical?

Unless there is identifiable information about your subjects, proprietary information about the other company, etc. in there, is there any reason why it would be unethical to send a research proposal? Just asking "Is this ethical" isn't terribly useful - you should have a specific concern. In that case, you could leave out that information with a note as to why it has been omitted. But a research proposal usually doesn't contain information like that.

Am I allowed to do that?

No one can answer that but your advisor, but I'd be surprised if the answer was "No".

I cannot contact anyone from my school to ask these questions but until Monday. I really would like to reply to the company right away because I need the participants.

If it would make you more comfortable, you could prep everything and then check early Monday morning - it's doubtful a delay over the weekend is going to change the company's response in a meaningful way.

I have my proposal ready; my doubt is if I should send them an entire proposal or just an outline; I was wondering if showing the entire document prior to being approved will have ethical repercussions for me. In my proposal I do mention the other organizations that I am planning to include in my study. These can be easily identified. That's the reason of my question.

I do not know what the role of the approval would be here, for this we do not have enough context. However, mentioning other organisations may be a problem (for you or them). It sounds like you should tread carefully.

@user47240 This could range from "Not a thing" to "A huge problem" depending on what you mean by "other organizations", what the study is, etc. Just wait until Monday.

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


text:
Are "fact sheets" an acceptable reference?
There are times in my research papers that I need to cite generally accepted facts. For example, health care costs are rising. The CDC and other large organizations often create "fact sheets" with dozens of facts about a topic. Many times these are only published as a webpage. Going through the references to find and interpret the original research is time consuming and seems excessive. For example, I might introduce a paper with "here are some facts about rising healthcare costs" to lead into the main research which is a method to help address those costs.
I've used these fact sheets previously in conference papers, but I'm curious if they are generally accepted by journals or if they are considered a weak source.

If they are summary statistics, where possible, it's better to cite the source report or dataset but in general it's reasonable to cite such fact sheets as a published document authored by either the named author(if named) or the department which has generated it.
If the summary stats are published as part of a report cite the report, if they're just published as a web page then you'd cite it as a web page with retrieval date included.
How strong a source they are depends on the fact and the source. For example, statements about population changes or similar on a web page published by the census bureau would be an extremely high quality source.
On the other hand a snippet of general health advice without citations in a public brochure may be of far lower quality.

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


text:
Are small conference posters bad etiquette?
I am displaying a poster at a conference. The board is 4 feet wide and 8 feet tall. My university offers 1 free small poster print per semester. I used their service and my final poster is only 3 feet wide and 2 feet tall.
The conference had no specific sizing requirements on their website. I contacted the conference organizers and they said it's small, but OK. This is my first conference. I still have time to pay a private printer for a larger size, but don't want to spend money if I don't have to. Is it bad etiquette to have an undersized poster?

Has your poster been shrunk to the point that text and figures cannot be read?

What country do you live in, and is it a large university? In my experience full-size posters cost around $20 to print, so if you're being quoted a higher number, make sure to check with over services.

The text size meets their requirements (1 inch for title, 1/2 inch otherwise). I live in the United States. What's considered "full size?" Local printing at FedEx is quoted at 36" x 48" - $129.99. I found many websites that will do it at half the cost, but would need to pay for express shipping to guarantee it's here on time.

4 feet by 8 feet seems enormous, are you sure that is right?

Yes. Double checked the website text and picture of the board. The board goes all the way to the floor and is setup portrait.

@cbake you don't have to fill up the whole board

A 2' tall poster is too small. I would not recommend a poster smaller than A0 size (about 3' x 4') nor larger than 2A0 (4'x6'). For a 4'x8' portrait orientated poster board I would recommend not less than 3' wide, but would not go all the way to 4' since often the boards are displayed in an accordion style resulting in lost width. As for height I would go no more than 5' high. While you do not need to be able to easily reach the title, no one likes reading at their knees. In other words, A0 size would be slightly small, but okay.
Depending on the material, I would suggest looking at large format black and white printing. For example, staples will do a 3'x4' black and white engineering print for $7.29.

A1 (~85x60cm) is still good for a poster and much easier to carry around. Also I find it a good exercise for students to improve presentation and prioritize what goes in the poster and what can be explained verbally - referred to the paper.


text:
Transition between Applied Mathematics, Physics and Astrophysics/Choosing future research field
Background: I am interested in physics, but I had to choose the Applied Mathematics programme for my undergraduate studies, which is the most physics-related choice among what was available. I dont't think I have enough knowledge about all the fields of physics to confidently determine my future direction yet.
To solve the problem, I want to ask about:

What is the common practice when changing fields for postgraduate students?
How should I find the most suitable field in physics? I might need more systematic education in experimental physics.
Is it generally better to take a one year physics related master's than finding the direction through self-learning and internship?

What countries are you considering? In the US it might be possible.

I applied to Europe universities. The tuition fees in the US and UK are too much for my family. @Buffy

For doctoral studies in US with a Teaching Assistantship there is no tuition and few (if any) fees. Health insurance is also usually included in most cases.

Such a transition is entirely possible. Many schools will enable you to take remedial undergraduate courses in physics during your Masters/PhD studies.

In the US, if you enroll into a combined Masters/PhD programme, the university will usually pay you a salary that will cover both your tuition and living expenses. For that, you will have to work as a Research Assistant or, more likely, as a Teaching Assistant. During your first year, you probably will be offered to assist with simple introductory courses.

There exist physics-related projects on which you can work while being a PhD student at a mathematics department. Here is one example.

In some areas of physics or engineering (e.g. celestial or orbital mechanics), your mathematical background will be not a disadvantage but an advantage. Sometimes a big one.

You seem to have unusual experience. I doubt that a first year doctoral student would "teach" a course. More likely assist in one, leading small breakout sessions for Q/A, as well as grading. Strictly speaking a TA or RA isn't a "scholarship", but a paid position. Salaries are modest, sometimes too modest.

@Buffy Yes, I of course implied "assist" and "salary". Fixed. Thank you.


text:
My old advisor won't let me go ahead and submit my paper. What do I do?
I am a PhD student currently needing advice on a paper submission issue with a previous supervisor (or advisor/mentor in some countries).
Last year, I discovered that my supervisor had not gotten ethics approval for part of my project, but she had been instructing me to collect the data anyway (sensitive personal info from cancer patients). The two other PhD students both had similar ethical and professional issues with this supervisor, so we decided to talk to our faculty about what to do. The university investigated and the supervisor got fired. The three of us had to start our PhD's again but we are all with much better labs now.
I wrote a systematic review last year with my old supervisor and a bunch of other co-authors. I was first author and my supervisor was senior and corresponding. We got knocked back from the first journal in October last year, shortly before all of the conflict happened. It's now been 6 months and I really want to submit the paper to a new journal (reviews go out of date quickly!). I have been instructed by my university to have no contact with the old supervisor, so I selected a new journal and decided to make myself the corresponding author, still leaving her as senior.
Here's where the problem is, I got advice from a few executives at my university and they supported me submitting the paper to a new journal but told me that we need to get consent from all authors including my old supervisor. The dean corresponded with the old supervisor on my behalf and (I was told) the supervisor responded saying something to the effect of 'I'm the senior author AND corresponding author and I need to submit this myself, no one else is to do it on my behalf'. The supervisor also said that it was 'on her list of things to do' but that was over 3 weeks ago and I haven't been notified of any submissions yet.
**Edit: This paper is a review and features none of the improper data. That data has been handed over to the university and will not be published.
I don't care who submits it, I just want it to get done. It seems as though she is intentionally being difficult and delaying things. My university have told me that unfortunately there isn't much I can do but wait for her to take care of it.
Are there any other options? I would hate to have worked so hard and have a great paper just sit there doing nothing.

This sucks. It sounds as though you may be out of luck on this paper. You have my sympathies; best wishes for the rest of your PhD.

What is the problem with you communicating with her directly?

You're not being reasonable. Three weeks is a short period and it was just over holidays. People have different priorities, be patient.

@ChristianHennig OP was expressly instructed not to contact the old supervisor.

Three weeks do not sound at all like being difficult. I’m in best terms with my ex supervisor but reference letters can take a month. In academic publishing, everything takes months. You are perhaps being too impatient.

Under normal circumstances, I would agree, but the OP's situation is/was obviously not normal. I think they are right to be concerned. But unfortunately there is nothing they can do other than wait.

Three weeks ago was Christmas and New year's Eve...

Your old supervisor clearly has a lot to consider currently, three weeks is a very short time in academia. Since she has been notified that you wish it to be published, and she said she will do it, it is in her hands now. It could reflect badly on you if you do anything contradicting what they have told you to do.
Hopefully she will get around to it, but in your current situation it does not seem to be anyway you could effect whether it gets published.

I don't know what I would do since I've never been in this position, but, one person who for all intents and purposes is no longer on the project (and was let go for ethics violations!!!!!!) can't simply delay the publication.
If I were you, what I would do is write to whoever the managing editor is and simply explain the situation, and ask the journal what their opinion is. At the end of the day, they have say over what you can and can't submit to them and the details surrounding it.
So, reach out to the editor. Explain the relevant details, and just ask them how this might be sorted out in terms of a submission.

Ethical violations on another project do not cause all of someone's rights to other work they've (co)authored to be forfeited. A coauthor can simply delay the publication. A reputable journal will not accept an argument like "this was cowritten by A, B, C, but C is a jerk, can we just leave them off?"

The argument is not "they're a jerk, leave them off the publication".

What is the argument?

@BryanKrause The question to the editor is: can a co-author maliciously delay the paper? Unfortunately, probably, the answer is yes. I assume that there are cases where this can be countervened, it does not look like that, here, though. I guess some diplomacy by the head of department might soften the stance of the old supervisor, not much time has passed yet.

TLDR
You absolutely can not publish this data without a human subjects board review, but maybe you can rescue it.
The longer story:
No journal will touch an article if the authors can't attest that proper ethical guidelines were adhered to.
The best you can probably do is to find someone willing to go to bat for you with the Human Subjects committee at your school.  If it turns out that informed consent was not required, for whatever reason, that committee may see fit to retroactively approve your study.  This might be the case if  there were no risks, or no concerns of privacy.
Otherwise, you might be completely out of luck.  A best case for you is that the committee might say something along the lines of "we'll allow you to contact the subjects to seek retroactive permission through a consent process".  I would imagine that might involve an explanation to the subjects concerning what went wrong, along with a promise to permanently delete the data if consent is not given.
Note that even approaching the Human Subjects people is not without risk, and there are probably people in your environs probably want this whole situation to go away with zero extra attention.  Human Subjects panels have reporting responsibilities for certain kinds of violations, and your case may fall into one of those situations.

I think there are two papers/projects in the OP: one is a project with novel data that was conducted improperly, which lead to the supervisor being fired. The other is a systematic review of the literature, with OP coauthored with, among others, that dismissed supervisor. OP is wanting to submit the latter systematic review.

I was under the impression that the projects were the same (or, only one project). If there's a second project (unrelated to the SR), then yes, unfortunately, they can delay the publication. But, the bigger area of concern in my mind is the IRB confirmations. If proper ethics standards weren't followed, then authorship is the least of the issues OP mentions. @BryanKrause

@JaredGreathouse Generally a review does not require ethics approval; as a review, it's summarizing from the literature, not collecting data from patients. The connections here are just that this explains the current bad blood with the dismissed supervisor and OP/their institution, and also because OP likely currently sees this review paper as more important than they would otherwise, because their project based on new data is dead due to the ethical lapses.

@JaredGreathouse as suggested by other commenters, this paper doesn't feature any of the data that was obtained unethically. I would just like to have my review published and was hoping someone might have a suggestion. It is an unusual situation, but I am optimistic that I will be able to gain credit for work I have completed.


text:
How to find the right audience for controversial, interdisciplinary research to get published?
In the context of research in topics subject to controversy, what strategies are there for getting it published?
A dutch cardiologist suggests that such research is difficult to get published. He recommends it for for experienced researchers.
I have been working on a manuscript for quite some time and would really like to get it published (move on) to consolidate my efforts. The research in the manuscript is controversial in two respects, perhaps because it is interdisciplinary. I believe my/our solution works, but the two disciplines really are not inclined to appreciate one another and accept the suggested solution. This situation makes it rather hard to find the right audience. I suppose scholars care more about what is published in highly esteemed journals, which may increase the motivation to refute the proposed idea. This may suggest submitting the manuscript in less prestigious, perhaps obscure, journals.

The discussion about Einstein and other topics has been moved to chat; please do not continue that discussion here.

This question has changed several times, the title does not make sense, and it's still not clear to me what the problem is. Questions that cannot be successfully clarified may be closed. Also, there are many past question here about how to select a journal; for example this one.

@cag51 how to best move on from here? the answer kindly provided by Allure does not answer the question as it stand currently, but the question as it was posed before. However, that was not the question I intended, but the one you thought I wished to raise. So, will you either permit me to delete this question, please, or just role back the edits I made, so that Allure's answer connects to the question. I think deleting this is much better.

I don't see an answerable question here other than the one I suggested. "How to find a journal" is far too broad to be answerable. So I would suggest rolling back to my version. We generally do not delete questions once they have received answers -- and in this case, doing so would not be fair to Allure. But if you don't want to roll it back (e.g., because you don't want that question associated with your account), the next-best thing would be to close it -- I can do that.

@cag51 in my opinion some of the comments to the question  understood it. I found them helpful. If you delete the question, can I then still access it? Or do I have to make a copy?

You seem to equate "obscure" with "fast". That's not necessarily true. Assuming your journal actually does serious peer review (i.e., it is not a predatory journal), then the two most important factors that govern publication speed are:

How active the editorial staff is
How fast they request their reviews

#1 is a big deal. If a review arrives and they make a decision within the next 24 hours, that cuts down processing time a lot. So does inviting reviewers as soon as one reviewer declines.
#2 is also a big deal. Reviewing takes a non-negligible amount of time to do, but most reviewers submit their reviews just before the deadline, so there is some sweet spot where you can maximize the number of reviewers that agree and also the number of reviewers that actually submit a helpful review.
But importantly, neither of these factors depend on how obscure the journal is. A highly prestigious journal does have the advantage that reviewers are more likely to agree to review when invited, but that advantage is utterly and completely dominated by the two factors above.
So no - it is not reasonable to publish in an obscure journal just to get the paper "over and done with quickly", because being obscure is not related to being fast. This doesn't mean some obscure journals aren't very fast, or vice versa. It just means that you aren't looking at the things that actually determine publication speed.

Hi, thanks, I believe a moderator changed the title/reframed the question, so it did not contain the element of controversy and how to handle it when trying to get published

@Johan it's looking like a different question now, so this answer may not apply; you may need to ask a new one (and also explain why a Google search for "how to choose a journal" does not apply).

indeed. I believe the moderator tried to help without being able to understand what I wanted to ask. I will probably ask another question.


text:
What expression to use when citing a publication for a result bordering one, oneself seeks to publish? (replicate, corroborate, in line with)
The specific reason for citing/referencing a publication may accompany an expression signifying that. One broad reason is empirical results (other broad reasons are theoretical ideas, methodological developments, grand conclusions, etc.). More specific reasons are that a result e.g. corroborates, replicates, is consistent with, is in line with, rejects, contrasts, etc.
I ask what accompanying phrase you might recommend when citing a published result in the following case: Paper B addresses a problem in the literature and solves it with a theory and some new data. A result in publication 'A' is relevant to the exact problem addressed in paper 'B'. So publication A should be cited. Again, the question is what phrase to use in the sentence that cites publication A. To provide some comparison between A and B, here are some features of publication A:

the result is found in a unique dataset.
measures/indicators are identical.
the exact result is partly displayed/documented in the publication, in the sense that a substantial part of the evidence for preparing what is displayed is not thoroughly documented statistically.
exactly this result was not interpreted/explained/problematized/reasoned but comes across as exploratory.
this exact result was not the focus or aim. Instead, the focus was, say, on some other aspect of the result, or the purpose was to use that exact result to progress to another analysis; maybe at a different level of analysis, etc., at least some other comparison or inference.
comes from a related but distinct literature (hence the inference is different)
the publication was not using the exact same statistical procedure(s) but one that is related (more basic), yet enabling substantially similar interpretation (although one would take steps to use additional statistical procedures).
it can be assumed in all likeliness and good faith that the result in A was computed later and has been underway shorter (though published earlier) and likely to have been inspired by B. (e.g. imagine a result was presented at a conference some time back - not the case, but imagine).
published in a niche outlet.

For instance, given 8., A might be called a replication of B. But replication is often used according to the order of publication date, right? But necessarily so?
A concern may be to not convey finding a result already published by others, and also not to accuse others of copying. I see some similarities to discussions on these questions:

Citing an unpublished paper? plagiarism?
Was I unreasonably left out of author list?
How to deal with my results being stolen?
Is there a time limit after which you should cite a working paper as an unpublished paper?
Researchers "forgot" to cite their previous relevant work
Recently published paper does not cite my very relevant work
How to respond to intentional lack of citation?
Recently published paper deliberately not citing our very relevant work -- anything to do?

Not quite following. Are these the same data, or different data? Aren't you the one doing the replication if you're doing it second? What is the plagiarism here?

Maybe some grey area there, but order of publication matters. It sounds like you're working on something and a similar finding is already out there. As far as the field is concerned, that makes yours the replication of what is already "known". Of course, replications are very important. If the previous result is an exploratory one, and yours is a prospective confirmation of that result, this is also very important. If you've just done a fishing expedition and come up with something comparable, that's also useful but not quite as key.

Really, I know you're trying to be generic here or to conceal your specific result, but I think you've gone too far and it's unclear what the actual situation is or what your actual question is. You mention plagiarism in the title but you don't even know what it is that would be plagiarizing.

What does it mean to "propose an explanation for a result (with unique data), which has in some way been published but without background for its problem and without being explained or interpreted", and why might this not be okay/why might each of those details matter?

Couldn't you just say something like "result X in [123] is in line with..."?

It would also help if your question is about how you should word things in your own publication, or whether you read this is somebody else's work and wonder whether this is appropriate. My personal feeling (under the proviso that I don't know details) is that "replication" seems exaggerated, "corroboration" is debatable but can maybe be defended, and I'd choose some weaker wording, see previous comment.

I don't think you need any of those phrases. Describe what the other study did and how it relates to your results. Don't make the mistake of thinking that one empirical paper is "scientific proof". Your paper is just one analysis of one set of data, just like theirs is.

I think that you are overthinking this situation (or I'm not understanding - your scenario is a bit convoluted). It seems like you are saying in a roundabout way that you feel like your work was scooped (unintentionally?) and you're not sure how to address it without weakening your own paper.
First off, A, being published first, would not be called a replication of B. You don't imply that anything was stolen or used without attribution, so I won't address that possibility. Unless there was some preprint or published version of B that should have been cited, it's hard to see this as anything other than bad luck (or good luck on the part of the authors of A).
Unfortunately, A beat B to the punch. There is nothing to do but cite A. I wouldn't make any statement about replication or anything of that nature - that doesn't seem to be what happened anyway. It should be sufficient to just discuss A as you would any other related work. It might weaken B. But it seems (based on your "hypothetical") that there is enough distinguishing the papers that it is a none-issue and, in fact, might strengthen the paper.


text:
Do grad school look at every application despite cGPA? For masters in urban planning
I attend McGill university and I have a learning disability (recorded by the school). During covid-19, adjusting was very difficult. Therefore, I do not have the best grades. However, since classes restarted in person and I received some help, I managed to pull on average a B+ and occasionally a B or A-.
I have a lot of passion for all things related to urban. To stand out despite my low grades, I did a double major (economics and urban studies), RA-ship in a related field and published some papers in undergrad journals. These are the achievements I would love to mention in my letter during application. I also fluently speak three languages and completed two internships in banking during my bachelors. However, would my average cGPA of 3.1 have me filtered? Or would the admission office still look at my recent grades and/or letter?

Edit: I also completed two internships in banking during my bachelors.

Please just use the "edit" button under the question to acually edit the question - do not post edits as answers. I added the info to your question.

In the US,  masters programs are typically self-paid. They vary in competitiveness and I know our medium program would not have an issue with a 3.1 GPA.


text:
Recommended course of action if I am facing potentially biased grading and bullying due to my disabilities
It's obviously a very undesirable thing to even contemplate suing my university, but please hear me out on it. I'm leaning in that direction and seeking advice from anyone who's been there before, please. Please let me know how it went, whether it was a good idea or a bad idea and all.
I go to a top 10 Canadian university, and we don't really do rankings or such so my school is reputation enough. In fact, it's more reputable than surrounding ones, so people have cautioned me against going running for the hills at this point, as I might jeopardize grad school opportunities. So, I may be stuck here and I may have to carefully navigate this situation, but in fairness to myself, hiring a lawyer may be my only option at this point. I study physics and economics, upper yrs.
However, bullying drove me away from physics, and now I'm seeking to major in pure math. I'm all signed up for the math courses for the upcoming academic year, and of course, physicists have to take a strong mathematical foundation in linear algebra and in calculus. So, although I'm very upset about having been driven out of physics by bullies, I'm trying to shrug it off an remain optimistic for all that I will learn as a future mathematician.
Nonetheless, I hit a new roadblock, and now I am at the last tether of my patience. Last semester, an economics professor relentlessly bullied and harassed me for my disabilities and injuries (I've been hit by a car). He called me a useless, broken kitten that no one would ever pick up from the animal shelter, and mistreated me in other ways as well. All of my assignments automatically got 0's on them, so this person was out to get me. I should have dropped the course, but you know, by the time I realized someone was out to get me, it was too late to drop penalty-free. Plus, I required this course if I wanted to get a double major in economics.
However, my tenacity in hanging tight backfired on me in the end. I got an F in the course. This is my first-ever failed grade in anything mathematics, economics, or even business-related (I was part of the business school before realizing that pure sciences were more my thing; I used to study finance). I had reached out to the department head the day of my final exam, saying that I would get an automatic F in the course because the game was rigged against me; this prof wanted to fail me. Furthermore, I had argued that I probably deserved an automatic pass in the course (C minus or greater), with a long list of reasons, including the bullying and harassment issues. I had also argued that I had run small businesses prior to re-engaging in university studies, so I almost deserved a free credit class anyhow. This was not an "entitlement" based argument, but rather, an argument that the school wouldn't want me suing for the disability harassment.
Lo and behold, I finally got my results in. I hadn't even bothered to check my transcript, so an exam supervisor had broken to me the scores to rip off the band-aid. We all knew I was headed for an F in that single course. I had seen it coming from 10k miles away, and it came. The dpt head is being stubborn with me. Several people have listened to my concerns about the disability harassment, including a school lawyer. But no one has taken my F seriously, which means that I'm left to hire a lawyer, from the looks of it. I'm exhausted, burnt-out from this situation, and depleted. Help please? How to best navigate the legal process? To be fair, I did not deserve an F, as this prof had wanted to see me fail and had gone out of his way to see it happen. Nonetheless, even if I had truly failed, this would have been the first time I could have failed such a class, and maybe it's no wonder why I couldn't have performed by best on the final exam (worth 70%) of my grade. Would appreciate any thoughts or perspectives, thanks.
edit: I can't delete a question that's been posted. This isn't about extortion, as I faced very bad circumstances with a professor and these obviously greatly hindered my ability to complete the coursework. I wound up consulting a lawyer but I doubt that I will pursue any serious form of legal action here. I think that people saying negative stuff obviously don't know what it's like to be bullied or harassed, as that's far scarier than involving a lawyer in anything. Nonetheless, I'm not going to comment further on anything here.

which country ?

If you are genuinely considering legal action then consult a lawyer before you do anything else.  It's not something anyone can reasonably expect to pursue on their own.  And as far as what you've done so far, some of the steps look to me like strategic mistakes that a lawyer would have advised you against.  But on the flip side, if you consult a lawyer, be willing to listen what they have to say, even if it's not the answer you were hoping for, and even if it seems totally unfair.

In particular, I think a lawyer would advise you against posting details of your case on the Internet, even anonymously (there is more than enough info here for someone at your university to identify it as you).  You might inadvertently hurt your cause by admitting something that the university would otherwise find it hard to prove.

@EarlGrey 2nd paragraph says Canada.

"I had also argued that I had run small businesses prior to re-engaging in university studies, so I almost deserved a free credit class anyhow." This sounds like a very entitled perspective, and it will not do your credibility any good to bring it up. I suggest forgetting about this fallacious argument entirely.

Yeah, that's ok thanks, but there's a nicer way to say so. I was my way of telling the school that they could just pass me for the course and shove it all under the rug. If they made me so sick that I couldn't write my final properly, well, it's not my fault. I was truly just an innocent bystander when all this occurred. Forgetting about the argument? Sure I can do that,

I'm very sorry to hear about your experience.  I just want to address one specific part:

Furthermore, I had argued that I probably deserved an automatic pass in the course (C minus or greater), with a long list of reasons, including the bullying and harassment issues. I had also argued that I had run small businesses prior to re-engaging in university studies, so I almost deserved a free credit class anyhow. This was not an "entitlement" based argument, but rather, an argument that the school wouldn't want me suing for the disability harassment.

To be honest, I don't think this is a likely outcome at all.  Academics in general, including your university's administrators, are likely to be dead-set against anything that looks like awarding academic credit when academic standards were not met, regardless of the circumstances.
As far as "already knowing the material": if that is something the university is generally willing to consider in awarding credit, they will have a documented procedure for you to demonstrate that knowledge and experience (e.g. credit by examination or "challenge"), and they're not likely to be willing to consider bypassing it.
Finally, "you wouldn't want me suing" can easily come across as pure extortion, making the university much less willing to compromise.
Instead of framing it as "I deserve credit for the course", I think you'll get farther by framing it as "I want a fair opportunity to complete the coursework and have it fairly evaluated".  Here are some possible solutions that I think the university might be more willing to consider, alone or in combinations:

Take the coursework you had originally submitted, and have it regraded by somebody else.  (Of course, this will not help if, due to the harassment or for any other reason, you were not able to submit work that was at a passing level.)

Drop the course from your transcript altogether.

Refund your tuition for the course, and/or let you retake it for free.

Let you demonstrate knowledge of the course material in some other way, e.g. by taking some version of a final exam, and assign a grade based on your performance on that.

Substitute some other relevant course (possibly from a different institution) to fulfill the requirement for the major.

Pay you some amount of money to settle your legal claims.

Also, at this point, I think you should at least consult with a lawyer, if legal action is within the realm of options you want to consider.  It isn't something you can reasonably take on by yourself, and without proper legal advice, you risk making the situation much worse.

Thank you so much for a thoughtful and honest reply, as I find some of these comments a little harsh and I never intended for harm when I had made this argument with my university. My plan had always been to successfully complete the course, and when things went very seriously awry with the bullying and harassment, I had reached out the day of the exam in a last-ditch attempt to not fail and to explain how badly I'd been bullied and how I could get credit instead. Did I negotiate badly? Yes, but not maliciously so. Your points are very helpful and those seem more valid as action plans.

Universities take inclusion and diversity very seriously and blatant cases of bullying need to reported appropriately.
Before considering suing the university, you might want to consider a simpler option of finding office that deal with academic grievances. The usually set up a separate panel having no conflict of interest. I Will strongly recommend that

This is what I recently suggested to a colleague that is having difficulties in reconcile his perspective with the one of his supervisor.
https://francescolelli.info/more/resolving-conflicts-in-academia/
In general, suing your institution should be considered as a last resort when internal avenues have been exhausted. Consequently, I would definitively recommend you to try an internal solution before. Overall, it is essential to evaluate the specific circumstances of your conflict and choose the most appropriate course of action based on your unique situation and the advice received from professionals.


text:
Coauthor ghosted me after paper rejection
I'm early in my career (undergrad in US) and I coauthored a paper with a graduate student. The paper is not groundbreaking by any stretch of the imagination, but it is my first publishable(?) research and I am proud it.
He was about to defend when we submitted the paper, so he assured me that we would resubmit if rejected, despite the rush around the defense time. The paper got rejected, but he successfully defended and left to a private research lab. Despite trying to reach him, I haven't gotten any response since a short thank you note (for helping with research, surprisingly) replying to my email congratulating him on the defense. He is occasionally active on Github. The only versions I could find of this paper are the current one on arxiv, which is an old copy without my name on it, or the unlabelled copy we submitted to the journal. The latex was on overleaf, but that seems to be unshared with me.
I'm at a loss as to what to do or why this happened. He even invited me to his defense and thanked me in the dissertation. His advisor is somewhat scary (blunt perhaps? he's quite famous and comes across as though he doesn't have time for anyone beyond his highest preforming PhD students), so I'm not sure if I should email him.
If I somehow get access to the paper (or copy it from the journal pdf to latex manually), would it be unethical to try to modify and resubmit by myself. The PhD student would definitely be an author given his contributions, but likely would have to focus on his current job if he even responds.

If your coauthor is absolutely determined not to publish the paper, there is nothing you can do but to move on and write other papers. But... there is always a chance that your coauthor will change his mind. This has happened to me: I had to wait for 3 years...

I disagree. It goes both ways. The OP can't publish the coauthor's name without consent. The coauthor does not get to hold the paper hostage indefinitely.

So at what point can I move on and continue with the paper?

You cannot submit a paper without the consent of all authors. When submitting, you normally have to confirm that all authors have read the final version and approve of submitting it to the journal. Not having consent of everyone--but telling a journal you do--is thus not only highly unethical but fraudulent.
It is unarguably not an ideal situation for you, but you should keep on trying to contact him and/or the advisor, who might at least be able to shed some light on the situation. Even though they might be intimidating, a request such as yours is perfectly reasonable and I would not be afraid to contact them.

So if he no longer wants to work on the paper, is it dead in the water?

@xxxxxxxxx If he continues to be unresponsive, is there a certain point at which I can move on with the research and submit?

@aome I don't think there is. Or maybe only after a much too long time. I wouldn't count on uit.

If this were my problem, I would waltz right in his advisor's office and ask if he's heard from my coauthor. If so, I'd explain the situation and see if he could meditate the situation at all, if I can't reach my coauthor. I wouldn't care how intimidating their advisor is, who they are, or what their reputation is, I have work that needs publishing and I won't let someone's attitude get in the way of that.
This doesn't mean you be mean of course, but you must be assertive go and speak to them in person and see if you can work this out.
Just as a note, this is why you also gotta be friends with your coworkers, sometimes. I've never met my other mentor/coworker (he's in NYC, I'm in Atlanta), but he's also my friend. I can text or call him, we text pretty much every day, we usually have weekly meetings. So while we're coworkers, we're also friends. My point, is that having a good personal relationship (even is you're not close "friends") is equally as important as a functional and good professional relationship. That way, you'd have a clear communication channel set up, instead of working with someone (it seems like) you don't know very well.

I'd say I was friends with my coauthor. That's what makes the entire situation more mystifying.

You can't submit the paper without the approval of all authors. It will generally violate publisher policies, and if the journal finds out that some authors actually don't approve of the submission, expect the manuscript to be desk rejected. Either you excise their contribution and submit without them, or you are stuck.
On the other hand, you can try harder to contact them. From your description it doesn't seem like you've tried very hard. Other things you can do are:

Give him a phone call.
Contact their supervisor. It sounds like you're intimidated by their fearsome reputation, but if you specifically need their help (this issue should qualify; they are only of only a few people that can help) then you should not worry about contacting them.
Contact their department receptionist.
Contact their office mates (i.e., other people sharing their office), if you can tell who they are.

Someone should be able to help you contact your co-author.


text:
Can we have a citation in the Works Cited and not use it in an essay?
I have a citation of an online article that I used in my research for an essay, yet I haven't referenced this citation anywhere in the essay. Should I keep the citation, or delete it because nothing refers to it?

A Works Cited by definition includes only the...works that you cited. So any extraneous entries should be removed.
In contrast, a bibliography can include all related work, even if you don't specifically refer to it. The goal of a bibliography is not only to cite the author's sources, but also to provide recommended reading for the reader.
In scientific journals, my experience is with the former. If you think a particular article has value, you can refer to it in the text, even obliquely (e.g., "X is widely discussed in the literature [1-15]. In this work, ...")

I would not include an entry in the bibliography of a paper if it is not mentioned in the essay in which it appears, for exactly the reason you cite. If a work is not mentioned in the essay, why should we believe that you used it in the article?


text:
Decline grad school for fellowship?
So, I have a bit of a dilemma on my hands.
I took a gap year after graduating from college, and I thought I was going to go straight to grad school after. I got accepted to multiple programs, and I already declined all of the programs except one.
Here’s the problem: I also applied to a competitive, two-year fellowship with a government organization, and I made it to the interview stage! And now, I changed my mind about going to grad school and I’d like to get more experience on my hands. Unfortunately, we won’t know if we get the position by July. Point is: there might be a chance I might decline the school after I accept my intent to go there if I get the fellowship. I know that grad schools (I applied to both public health and heath administration)  allow deferment for only a year, but I’d like to have a backup plan just in case I don’t get the fellowship (which is go to grad school).
So let’s say if I do get the fellowship, should I just be honest with the school I accepted and tell them I want to do the fellowship? Or take a risk and decline the school and I hope I get the fellowship?
If I do the former, I just hope that this won’t hinder me from other schools considering  my application the next time I apply to grad school. I’m applying right after the fellowship, and this time I INTEND to go back to school.
Thanks.

A major fellowship may be enough to get a grad school to agree to a longer deferment. However, even if they're not willing to extend you a two-year fellowship, when you reapply, you will have that major program under your belt, and will be a stronger candidate than many in your field applying straight out of undergrad.
So I wouldn't worry too much about this in terms of your long-term grad school prospects.

Thank you. The program is the CDC Public Health Associate program. I made it to the interview stage, and I'm really inclined to do it if I get it. I'm just worried that the university will have a grudge against me, if accept their program, and possibly declining later on.

If they’re not willing to work with you, you’d be just as justified in holding a grudge against them!


text:
Eligibility for PhD in the USA
(Note: For international students)
If someone has a gap of more than 5 years after obtaining a masters degree, are they eligible for a PhD in the USA?

I don't think there is any such restrictions...

The edit changed it from 3 years to 5. The answers are still valid, I think. But the "productivity" in the meantime might be considered. But in general, in the US, lots of people who "always wanted" to do a PhD end up doing so late in life. My university had a number of such students. But if you apply you will get better information and feedback on your particular situation.

Actually i was confused that  some certain age restriction may be there..  so i edit agains ...now got its   thanks u sir @Buffy

There is no restriction that a PhD should be done right after a Master's degree.
For instance, I knew a returning PhD student of age >50 at a major US university.
Depending on what the candidate did in the three years in between, snatching a precious place in a PhD program may be either more difficult or easier.


text:
what is the deep meaning of this quote by Grothendieck?
what is the deep meaning of this quote ?
"A good mathematician always soaks his nuts while trying to solve a problem."
by Grothendieck
Reference:https://mathoverflow.net/questions/5499/which-mathematicians-have-influenced-you-the-most/5828#5828

What is the source of this quote? And what makes you presume it has a "deep meaning"?

@JochenGlueck see this

Are you sure you have a correct translation? "Soaks his nut" (singular) could mean gets drunk as "nut" is a synonym for brain in some cultures. It needn't mean gonads and it might just be a dirty joke if it does. "Grothendieck" is a bit of a synonym for "odd duck", actually.

I don't know that interpreting proverbs should be on-topic for Academia.SE, regardless of whether an academic said something.

In the context of the linked question, a "nut" is a hard problem. Soaking the nut is softening it up, much the way that Einstein worked toward relativity. "If I'm traveling at the speed of light holding a mirror, will I see my image?"

@BryanKrause, If my latest comment is correct, then it really is on-topic here.

Im not sure  sir @Buffy I just copy and paste from the given link

This has little to do with academia. Better to ask on mathematics.se

My best guess is that he is just being a bit "dirty" or politically incorrect to make the point that hard problems (nuts) need to be softened up (soaked) in order to attack them.
Much of Einstein's work toward relativity was just a thought experiment based on the experimental work that preceded him. He was trying to determine whether the aether existed as a medium for the propagation of light.
His fundamental insight came from asking himself "If I'm traveling at the speed of light holding a mirror, will I see my image?". He pondered that for a long time and it helped him bridge the gap from 19th to 20th century physics.
Academics aren't always "nice" in the way they express things. It can be interpreted as "playful" or offensive.

Grothendieck never said what you claim he said.
In fact, this question seems a bit disingenuous. You provided this MathOverflow link, but in fact, you have quoted only the last comment in the thread, which is pretty obviously a joke. If you look just two comments above the one you quoted, you'll see that someone already provided the actual quote you are asking about (in English).
Anyway, for the curious, here is the actual quote in the original French:

Je pourrais illustrer la deuxième approche, en gardant l’image de la noix qu’il s’agit d’ouvrir. La première parabole qui m’est venue à l’esprit tantôt, c’est qu’on plonge la noix dans un liquide émollient, de l’eau
simplement pourquoi pas, de temps en temps on frotte pour qu’elle pénètre mieux, pour le reste on laisse faire
le temps. La coque s’assouplit au fil des semaines et des mois - quand le temps est mûr, une pression de la main suffit, la coque s’ouvre comme celle d’un avocat mûr à point! Ou encore, on laisse mûrir la noix sous
le soleil et sous la pluie et peut-être aussi sous les gelées de l’hiver. Quand le temps est mûr c’est une pousse
délicate sortie de la substantifique chair qui aura percé la coque, comme en se jouant - ou pour mieux dire, la
coque se sera ouverte d’elle-même, pour lui laisser passage.

and my translation:

I could illustrate the second approach with the image of a nut that one must open. The first parable that came to my mind earlier, is immersing the nut in an emollient, perhaps water, and rubbing it occasionally, so that the water penetrates better, and we let time do its work. The shell softens over the course of weeks or months; when the time is ready, a little pressure from the hand suffices, and the nut opens up like that of a ripe avocado! Or even better, one lets the nut mature under the sun and under the rain and maybe even under the winter frosts. When the time is ripe a delicate sapling will emerge from the substantial flesh that will have pierced the shell, as if playing - or to put it better, the shell will have opened on its own, to let it pass.

So, I disagree a bit with the accepted answer: (1) there is no double entrendre in the original or in a good translation, and (2) the quote is not so much about "recasting" the problem in a more tractable form, but more about giving oneself the benefit of months or years to reflect on a problem from many different angles, rather than trying to force something through on a tight deadline.
Finally, one editorial comment: while there is certainly wisdom here, perhaps we should find a similarly elegant quote espousing the opposite view: applying energy and finishing things quickly is often better than spending years and years in deep thought without actually accomplishing anything.

This is a fine translation. Thanks for providing the real context.

Ah, good that you found the original!

Although I do not have resources at this moment to give citations, I can aver that the phraseology about "soaking a nut" (to be able to open it) is one of Grothendieck's (and others') metaphors regarding different methodological attitudes.
Specifically, I believe it was Grothendieck who said something to the effect that Serre would deliver a sharp blow to open a hard nut... while he, Grothendieck, would gradually soak it to soften it, and almost without effort eventually open it.
The specific wording of the quote in the question, if accurate, is a cutesy middle-school-provocative rewriting of the actual comments, to achieve the ambiguity. The original (obvs in French), and the natural English translation, did not achieve such a pseudo-provocative silliness.

Regarding the French version being less crude, see https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calembour

@henning, my French is insufficient to detect a double entendre in the French in this case... But a more neutral English translation seems to be "soak a nut" not "soak their nuts"... I'd have to find the original. :)