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What is the correct APA citation style with two places and two publishers
Is this the correct APA form of citation with two publishers in different locations?
Cazes, S., & Verick, S. (2013). The labour markets of emerging economies: Has growth translated into more and better jobs? Geneva. UK: ILO-Palgrave Macmillan.

From this APA library guide it says;

If more than one publisher is given, use the first one or the one that
  represents the home office, if given.

This answer at writer stackexchange supports this as well
So for your example the following should be fine for APA

Cazes, S., & Verick, S. (2013). The labour markets of emerging
  economies: Has growth translated into more and better jobs? Geneva:
  ILO.

The title should be in italics though, no?

@OGC Yes it should, my bad. Edited now.

I'm going to say something perhaps controversial here: I do not believe that location information is really relevant any more.
Consider, in your example, Palgrave Macmillan: Wikipedia tells me it is located in London, New York, Shanghai, Melbourne, Sydney, Hong Kong, Delhi, and Johannesburg.  And what good does it do to know that?  After all, anyone attempting to access the reference is going to use a library or the internet, rather than attempting to physically call some office in Melbourne to order a copy.  My point is that I think you should fill in this obsolete slot with something reasonable (like you have done), but that I don't think it will actually matter to anybody.
It does seem reasonable to keep both imprints of publisher, and a hyphen like you've used (or maybe a slash) seem like reasonable enough ways of doing so.

I feel your sentiment and don't find it controversial, but it's not how APA says you should do it.


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Verifying that cited results are still current before publishing
Assume you are knee-deep in a project, going through a series of papers that are seemingly relevant to your project. You found this ~10 year old paper, which looks very promising indeed. A lot of interesting results, good discussion, etc.
At this stage, I think it's obvious that you should check whether or not the results and conclusions in the paper are still valid by searching for any correspondence related to the article (e.g., pointing out that some claims do not hold, etc). However, I have yet to find anyone that digs into such information. You normally find a paper, read it, find more interesting papers through references and keep on digging in this manner until you have accumulated "enough" articles to form an educated opinion.
My questions are as follows:

Is this (or any other) type of quality assurance process, when it comes to cited literature, common practice?
Is there a way to streamline this process? PubMed does not seem to include all correspondence related to each article.

I should perhaps note that, if you are in biomedical sciences (especially related to complex diseases), about half of the publications turn out to be wrong or misleading after some years, and perhaps a quarter more are shown to be incomplete in its findings. I believe it's in the nature of biology, in contrast to more human defined sciences like mathematics or computer science. There are no formulas or calculations to check the integrity of the work published.

Those are Review papers usually.

Related, maybe even duplicate: How to find all of the responses to a published research paper? I suggest you edit the question to focus on the first part, which is different from the question I link…

I think what you're looking for are the papers that cite a given paper. This is often listed as "Cited by" in various databases. If paper B shows that paper A is incorrect, paper B will almost always cite paper A. In that vein, you can look at all the works that cite a given paper to see if any disprove the results.
More typically, though, if a paper published 10 years ago is still relevant today, there are other more recent papers on the same topic which will either cite that paper or derivative works thereof, and you would use those more recent papers to ascertain the current state of the research. Old papers, particularly in quick-moving fields, tend to either fade away pretty quickly or serve as foundations for other research. If no one else has cited it in the interim period, it's probably worth taking a very critical look at why that is the case before throwing in all your chips on that single paper.

There are cases where something is seriously wrong/arguable with a paper (e.g. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512005637) In such cases the correspondences/replies come in as separate entities, not just papers that cite and criticize the original paper. I have to disagree with you regarding articles becoming foundations due to continued validity, it could just as well be due to the fact that people care more for having references than for doing a QA on cited literature, or am I completely off the mark?

@posdef - Not sure what that linked article is, but there are links directly on that page to the resultant comments. Yes, they aren't peer-reviewed articles, but they are still academic publications, and they cite the relevant article in such a way that you could find it using a "cited by" search.

@posdef - Regarding your second comment, I disagree; researchers usually don't just cite to get citationCount++. They will cite when the cited paper is relevant to their work for one of many reasons; examining a related aspect of the same problem, found similar/different results, provided a springboard for this problem, etc.

Sadly, some citations exist solely as a defense against referees who might react badly to their vaguely-related paper not being cited, not because they're actually relevant.

@JeffE true, besides I personally know PhD students that hunt down articles that seem to have relevant information in order to strengthen the interpretation of their results, without actually dissecting the work described in the paper in question.

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What are the tradeoffs involved in taking a postdoc at a top university versus an assistant professorship at a non-top university?
When it comes to getting a tenure-track position where one has both a lot of resources and academic freedom to do what one wants to do (so having a tenure-track position in a top university might be more useful because one may get more resources at a top university).
Or in short, when one wants to maximize one's chances of becoming a "top scientist".
There are obviously numerous factors, and "rank/prestige" should not be considered as a factor in itself. That said, the period after one gets a PhD is an extremely important time for building up connections, and those are easier to get at a top university.

"Better" for what? According to whom? Given what career plan? In what field?

If rank/prestige isn't a factor, then I'm unclear on what you mean by "academic advancement".  If your goal is to get a tenure-track job, and you don't care how prestigious it is, then a tenure-track position is by definition better than a postdoc.  If you have other goals, then the answer may vary, but I'm not sure how to give a comprehensive answer (except by a case analysis for possible goals).

Okay - tenure track position. I'll explain more.

Maybe the question intention is: "postdoc in order to get better job VERSUS job right now" ?

What field are you in?  (This significantly affects the definition of "postdoc".)

Earth/Atmospheric Science. But I intend this to be more of a general question for people here since no one in Earth/Atmospheric science hangs out here.

Getting experience at a top university is good for your CV and for you as a researcher.
Getting more research experience under your belt can increase your chance of getting a job in the future, but there are no guarantees.
A post-doc will give you a chance to write more papers and to find out what topic you really want to do your research on.
Taking the assistant professorship now would get you immediately on the track to full professor, which may be delayed if you spend years doing a post doc.
Working at a non-top university might mean that the students you have access to, for example, as RAs or PhD students, to develop your research vision, will not be as good as at the top university. That said, as a post-doc, you will generally not have access to such students anyway, except perhaps as part of a collaboration.
The pressure to succeed at a top university is much greater than at a non-top university.

A post doc is merely a step towards getting a tenure track position. I would always suggest taking the tenure track job. The only time I would even suggest thinking about it is if the tenure track position has a heavy teaching load (e.g., 3-3 or higher in the sciences and 4-4 or higher in the humanities). Even with a ridiculous teaching load I would still suggest the tenure track position.
Not everyone with a postdoc at a top university gets a tenure track job afterwards.

It may be merely a step, but it can be a lot of fun and can really contribute towards one's development as a scientist.

Nor should one neglect the degree to which a postdoc may be a step toward failing to get a tenure track job, in which case you need to consider the extend to which you are getting experience that may be less helpful in industry while also getting paid less than you would in industry...

@dmckee I don't understand what you are saying.

Not every postdoc will get on the tenure track (much less achieve tenure), and postdocs do work similar to what they would do if they got into industry for less money. There is a cost to keeping your sights on academia.

A postdoc is not a career goal; it's yet another step in training, with the purpose of preparing the trainee for the eventual faculty role. With that in mind,
Postdoc is good because:

You're associating yourself with some top-notch researchers and gaining valuable research experience.
You're learning new techniques and methodologies from a well-known and well-respected professor.
You're writing grant proposals that are X times more likely to be funded because <well-known researcher>'s name is on them.

Faculty is good because:

You're running your own lab and getting experience managing teaching, research, mentoring, and administrative duties.
You're proving that you can do it by yourself.
You can do research on your own interests, without having to worry about what your PI wants you to do.

Additionally, think about the opportunity cost of both choices... it really depends on where you want your career to go.

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What does author order indicate?
When you look at a paper, what order to you assume the authors are in? Most important/most work done first or alphabetical? In my group we usually use alphabetic order, but I've been wondering if that might create a misleading impression with lots of people.
On a related note, would you expect the name of a PhD student to be always first on publications related to her/his work?

Obligatory PhD comic: http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=562

You might also want to read: http://mathoverflow.net/questions/19987/math-paper-authors-order

Closely related: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2467/what-does-first-authorship-really-mean

Because of different tastes in different departments, isn't it better to narrow your question to a specific field or major? Because I know that some departments prefer alphabetical order, some others prefer the level of contribution, some departments prefer their PhD students to be the first author, etc.

The answer is strongly conditional on discipline and, to a lesser extent, country of origin. Conventions vary widely, as does the degree to which they are institutionalized. For instance, in some fields (e.g., Philosophy), co-authorship is not common and there is no convention about attribution, so absent an explicit note people are are likely to think the more senior author is the primary one. In Sociology, co-authorship is common and the convention is that the first author is the lead author unless there is a note indicating equal authorship. In Economics, co-authorship has become increasingly common over the past few decades but the convention is to list authors alphabetically, regardless of degree of contribution. In some fields the primary author may be determined by looking to see if there's a note specifying to whom correspondence should be directed, regardless of order of authorship on the paper.
Meanwhile in many lab-based science disciplines, where it's sole authorship that's rare, author order is governed by different norms. In some fields,  the first author is the one who is primarily responsible for the paper (what that means can vary, too), the last author is the lab head or primary grant-holder, and the order of authors in between is sometimes influenced by other norms. But other conventions exist, too. Knowing what they are and how to interpret them is part of one's socialization into a discipline.
To make things more complicated, some fields—or some journals, or some labs, or some individual authors—may have their own rules or conventions designed to clarify things by listing credit more explicitly. Even worse, there may be a kind of hermeneutics of author-order where people parcel out credit to different contributors regardless of order of authorship, as when someone says "Sure, X is the first author and Y helped him write it up but it's obvious the paper was Z's idea".
In your case, if your lab or unit is using a convention that's not standard in your field the most straightforward solution is to make a note of this in your articles. This isn't an ideal solution because papers will still be cited or referenced without people paying attention to your clarifying note, but there isn't much you can do about that.

A corresponding author isn't necessarily the primary author: they may just be the person who was willing to deal with submitting the paper and the resulting correspondence.

Yes, that's why that sentence begins with the words, "In some fields the primary author may ..."

Can you give any example of a field where being corresponding author indicates being primary author?

In my field (Epidemiology) I would always assume that the authorship is appearing in the "Most important work first, PI/major senior contributor last, others in the middle" authorship scheme, but it varies dramatically based on field.
Under that scheme, I would expect the papers that emerge from a PhD students dissertation to have them as the first author. Ancillary papers, those where their results/data are published as part a compendium of findings from a larger study, etc. are where I wouldn't necessarily expect their names to show up first.

what would you do if there were 3 authors and all three contributed equally?  Or, what if there were 3 authors, and the bulk of the work was done by two authors (the third contributed to writing some of the sections but was not the primary author of those sections).

Generally, in situations like that, my usual rule is "Whoever wrote the main body of the paper is first author". In your 2nd case, Authors 1 and 2 seem like good candidates for joint first (I'd make them switch off who was first-first in my lab between papers), and Author 3 is a logical 2nd author.

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How can we recognize accurate scientific results when things like p-hacking are so common?
Research has shown that most of the published studies in various fields are false. For example, the Reproducibility Project: Psychology only managed to confirm 36% of previous 100 psychology studies had a statistically signifiant result the second time. Also, only 6 of 53 studies considered landmark in cancer were successfully replicated. In these circumstances, when such a quantity of false studies pass the peer-review process in most scientific fields, how can we filter authentic information from fields we don't have expertise in?

Welcome to Academia SE and thank you for your question. Can you please [edit] it to clarify whether you want to ask about p hacking (as indicated by your title) or general problems leading to irreproducibility (as described in the body of your question). I recommend the former, as the latter would be rather broad.

From (RP confirmed 36% of results) does not follow that (64% of results are false).

First thing to consider is that research can never provide absolute certainty. Any result you find is only preliminary. You can have various degrees of preliminary: a single study with an acceptable but not brilliant design can provide interesting clues or first steps for a larger project, but not much more. It is right and productive that these studies are published, but don't treat them as truth.
Second thing to consider is that the problem is not necessarily with the articles themselves, but with the lack of replication. So, if you find a result that interest you, try to find replications. If none exist, then you need to be more careful.

Your first point is very important.  p = 0.05 always means there is a recognized possibility that the result will not replicate even if the research was done and analyzed as perfectly as possible..  However, the OP's invocation of "p-hacking" indicates that they are concerned with papers whose findings are not robust to replication b/c their p-values are not accurate due to design or analyses that compromise a valid interpretation of the published p-value..

The p-curve (see p-curve.com) has been proposed as a way of identifying whether a set of results is likely to have been p-hacked.  The term and technique was coined and/or developed by Uri Simonsohn and colleagues, who blog about replication and p-curving at Data Colada.

"P-Curve Won’t Do Your Laundry, But Will Identify Replicable Findings"
"Ambitious P-Hacking and P-Curve 4.0"
"P-curve vs. Excessive Significance Tests"

The technique has been applied by several research groups besides Simonsohn et al, ie Head et al 2015
There have been critics of p-curves (including John "most published finding are wrong" Ionnadis ), as well as other techniques such as excessive significance tests and the distribution of published p-values.
Some references:

Simonsohn,  Simmons, Nelson (2014) "P-Curve and Effect Size: Correcting for Publication Bias Using Only Significant Results" Perspectives on Psychological Science V9(6) p.666-681
Simonsohn, Nelson, Simmons, (2014) "P-curve: A Key to the File Drawer," Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, V143(2), p.534-547
Simonsohn, Simmons, Nelson (2015) "Better p-curves" Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Ioannidis and Bruns.  2016. p-Curve and p-Hacking in Observational Research.  PLoS ONE.
Head et al 2015 The Extent and Consequences of P-Hacking in Science.  PLoS ONE


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Is there a list of all online creative commons based journals?
I know there is a good list of all paper peer-reviewed journals but I would like to know is there one specially for creative commons based online journals? I am kind of trying to figure out which is better to publish in terms of access to "outsiders"-people who aren't research scientists and most likely will never care about research journals but if I post a link to my paper on a social media site would make the effort to see it. Is there anyone here who has experience with such audience? Publishing not for the colleagues, but for the general public. You know people these days don't like to pay to view something on the Internet and if your audience isn't a member of a faculty impact factor is crap. But I wish to know can my papers go through at least some kind of(even very rudimentary)peer-review process. This is why I am looking for a list of free online journals who have at least someone with academic background on their editorial board.
Does such a thing exists?

I would suggest writing a blog. You can ask some of your colleagues to read it in order to get "rudimentary peer review".  Your intended audience will be much more likely to read it.

I have tried writing in forums, social media, for sites for the general public, etc. but my feedback(at least in most cases)was that the site administrators(although they aren't scientists and often have no background in science)would much prefer to have to cite a peer-review paper in order to accept my text. It just helps a lot. I think the Internet is going in a direction where even a layman wants to see this text is based on some peer-reviewed work. And if you can provide a free-of-charge original peer-reviewed online paper he or she can read this adds credibility.

The point I make is in such cases the layman trusts the peer-review process itself, not the quality of the review. My experience is very few "common people" understand how peer-review works or even care for that matter. For them it is enough that you can say this journal has peer-review and this is science(see for example how those who oppose man-made climate change back up their claims with "scientific arguments"). This is why don't care what is its impact factor. What is important in the case is only to show it is a scientific journal. This is why ask about creative commons journals.

I hope you can "feel" the topic of my question. But if you have any suggestions how I can improve it, please, write them down.

The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is "a community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals."


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Prestigious institutions with open admissions policies
Has any college in the US managed to unite being prestigious and being open access, at undergrad or grad level. I mean open enrolment in the European sense, where they have kind of minimal requirements (language cert, high-school and not much more).
I wonder, given that they could charge thousands $/year, what's the problem with admitting mass-wise new students (and provide them with decent teachers, materials and the like). Why limit the number of clients you get?

There are two fundamentally opposing ideas here. Yes, it would be nice if everyone could afford, and be admitted to, a top-tier university. But that's simply not how prestige works.

If you admit lower quality students, the number of truly excellent graduates is diluted and your university will lose prestige.
The loss of prestige may mean a gradual decrease in the quality of faculty, as the very best are hired by other prestigious universities. You'll certainly need to hire more professors to teach the extra students, and can you be sure that all the new hires will be just as good as those you've already got? There are only so many researchers in the world worthy of Nobel prizes.

An everyman's university will never have the prestige of a university such as Oxford, Caltech, or MIT. The key to the success of these top universities is consistency. Damn near every one of their graduates is a top performer, which is very desirable to employers (and also quite attractive for prospective faculty).
Once you lower the barrier to entry, their perceived quality will head downwards, and the flow-on effects will snowball.
There are many very excellent (and open) universities that are not as prestigious as they perhaps deserve, for example ETH Zurich is a truly excellent university that is open to all Swiss citizens who have passed their high school exams. This Times Higher Education ranking page shows somewhat quantitatively the elitism that is at play.

Don't Oxford, Caltech, or MIT have  legacy admission? Or being admitted as athlete, minority and the like? Or any other non-academic rules that push the level down?

How can some universities in Europe (apparently not in the UK), be prestigious and still open?

@QuoraFeans See my updated answer. They may be extremely good, but they don't command the level of prestige that they perhaps deserve.

Oxford, at least, have no admissions route other than by academic prowess as demonstrated by results and performance at an interview. Occasionally a strong interview and extenuating circumstances (medical problems, deprived background,  etc) may be allowed to compensate for weaker exam results. However, we're talking "very good" instead of "excellent". I can't comment on CalTech et al.

Can you define what you mean by prestigious?

@StrongBad I would define a "prestigious" university as one that is in the top 10 or 15 in the world. The next few hundred are no doubt excellent universities, but most of them don't command worldwide respect and admiration to nearly the same degree. I'm talking about the elitist few at the very top.

If folks are going to downvote my answer, I'd appreciate knowing why you disagree.

@Moriarty Don't take it personally. I assume this is one of those cases where people don't like your answer and thus downvote it (despite being arguably 100% correct).

One minor comment though - I am not sure how ETH could be more prestigious. In my circles, ETH is widely considered the by far best european university for technical sciences.

Having looked at ETH's admissions policy it seems mad to me. What is to stop 1000 students deciding they want to sign up to course x one year and completely overwhelming the available facilities?

@nivag Given that the system seems to be working rather nicely since a long time, I assume it is not "mad". For your concrete case: what prevents this from happening is simply basic statistics - you don't get that large, unpredictable changes in student interest in practice, even if you don't specifically prevent it. Small changes are simply covered by small resource re-allocations (e.g., move some TA money).

The best example, that I can think of, of a mainstream US university that is respected at both the national and international levels with a policy that is something like open access is Arizona State University. They have a fixed bar admissions policy: https://students.asu.edu/freshman/requirements

Applicants must also meet at least one of the following:
Top 25% in high school graduating class
3.0 GPA in competency courses (4.0 = A)
ACT 22 (24 nonresidents)*
SAT Reasoning 1040 (1110 nonresidents)*

Prestigious is a difficult concept to quantify. To some if it is not Harvard, then it is not prestigious. That said, ASU ranks in the top 150 in both the US news and THE rankings. Which I think puts them well within a reasonable definition of prestigious.
However, I think they are probably on the border of both "open access" and prestigious. That said, Arizona is not a particularly affluent state, so I think there is the potential for the model to work.

In partial disagreement with Moriarty's answer, I think that ETH in Zurich is an excellent example of a university that is both prestigious and open-access.
I was told by people there that the university is very sink or swim, and that each year they routinely fail a majority of the students taking, say, freshman calculus. (And that "freshman calculus" there is more like real analysis in the US.) A bit harsh, but I think necessary if you want to maintain extremely high standards but be open to all.
I don't know of any US university that does this.

Question is about US universities that have done this, and if not why. This therefore does not seem to answer the question.

Well, I said that no US university to my knowledge does this. As to why; why is no US university willing to fail 80% of its students? I don't think this admits a factual answer, other than to perhaps say it goes against American culture.

Indeed, there are many pressures on a US university to have a high graduation rate (rankings, etc).

The "throw everybody in and see who swims" approach is also commonly applied in other open universities, e.g., in Austria. In my alma mater we had graduation rates way below 25% in computer science. Really kills us in rankings, but that's more a systemic difference than anything else.


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Writing an REU recommendation as an Instructor
I'm a new full-time faculty member in the process of finishing my PhD. Because I have not yet graduated, Instructor is the only title I feel comfortable using until I defend.
A student has asked for a letter of reference to an REU program, and I've become concerned that a letter from an Instructor may not be as highly received as a letter from some rank of Professor. In particular the REU is a research position and Instructor doesn't make it clear that I've been involved with research in any capacity. (I did in fact mentor 6 REUs while a grad student and several more independent study undergrads, and think that this particular student is a fine candidate.)
I should note that I was asked for a letter based on having this student in class, and I feel I can write a strong letter for this individual on their qualities as a student. Another faculty member (Assistant Professor) is writing a letter based on an extracurricular project.
Two questions:
1) Will my Instructor rank cause problems for this student? Of course my letter will be less highly regarded in general due to my newness, but does being an Instructor present an additional hindrance on top of that?
2) If so, is there anything that can be done in the letter itself to mitigate this? Or, should I counsel the student to pursue a different recommendation?

Include the following information in your letter:

You're a new full-time faculty member.
You mentored 6 REUs while a grad student and several more independent study undergrads, and think that this particular student is a fine candidate.

If your job title and academic rank is "assistant professor", then that's what you should put on your REU recommendation letter.  This also applies if you don't  have an official title, but your position is considered tenure track.  It's not particularly relevant to the letter that you don't have a Ph.D.
More generally, it's fine to be a little insecure about not having a Ph.D. yet, since this is certainly not the norm for a starting full-time faculty member.  But this letter isn't about you, and you have a professional responsibility to represent your academic rank accurately on a letter of recommendation.  This means that you report the rank that your college has bestowed upon you, not the rank that you personally think that you deserve.
If your job title really is "instructor", you should make it clear in your letter that you have been involved in research.  For example, you could mention as part of your recommendation that you were involved in mentoring a group of REU students at (insert college here), and that the student you are writing the letter for seems at least as capable.


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Renewal of postdoctoral appointment
I noticed during my application process for post-doc jobs that several say "1-2 year appointment" or "possible renewal for second year". I understand from this answer that it is in everyone's benefit to not be "stuck" in a postdoc situation for too many years for fear of starving oneself.
My question is, if not mentioned, what is the general criteria for a renewal of postdoc appointment to a second year (or perhaps to a third)? Most of the applications I have put in to labs/univs. are not clear at all on renewal criteria. Is it based on need? performance? Mutual understanding? Does anyone have examples on some of these situations?

Have you asked your postdoctoral advisor(s) about their evaluation criteria? I would think that it varies from person to person.

My feeling is that unless there are funding issues, there would be some resistance to firing a postdoc unless there were real problems: the startup cost/time for a new postdoc can be high.

@Suresh Your answer does make sense considering that some of the post-docs offered have a long-ish (~2 month long) security clearance type situation.

Maybe I'll convert to an answer.

My feeling is that unless there are funding issues, there would be some resistance to firing a postdoc unless there were real problems: the startup cost/time for a new postdoc can be high.
Having posted ads like these myself before, I can say that one non-funding-based reason to mention a 1-2 year postdoc is to allow for a hedge in case the hired person turns out to be really bad. In that case, you have the option of doing a first-year review and dismissing the person (i.e the default bit is set to NO and some activation energy is required to make it a YES)
In the reverse case of a two-year postdoc, the default bit is now YES and significant activation energy is required to make it a NO. If not done right, this could even lead to charges of unfair dismissal and so on.
So since there's a glut of postdocs and a short supply of positions, the "buyers" have some power to shape the position to suit their needs.


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Prospect of pro-bono/voluntary work with current advisor after graduating with PHD
As an international student in the united states, I am legally allowed to work for 12 months, extendable to 29months for STEM fields, after graduating with my PhD (or masters degree for that matter) without having to change my visa/student status.
Now, I am looking for post doc opportunities in the US at several univerities but unfortunately none of the PI's respond to any queries OR application material that I send them for opportunities advertised on their websites.
I am seriously considering working voluntarily, without pay for my current advisor after I graduate in Dec 2012 with my PhD in Mechanical Engineering.

I am legally allowed voluntarily as part of the optional practical training period available to me after graduation.
I intend on doing my post doc / work pro-bono in the US because, lets face it, my home country doesn't really do much research and the pay grades are about $140 a month for fresh PhD graduates whilst I earn several times more as a grad student here in the US.
Visa regulations make it horrendously difficult to move to an other country for post doc opportunities and it is easier for me to continue in the US as I am alreadly legally here.
I am planning on writing a couple of proposals with my advisor so that I may grow my own post doc
It is an absolute pleasure working for my advisor and I wouldn't mind doing it for free for the mental stimulation that it provides (although I wouldn't want to work for free forever teeheehee :P)

How should I approach this situation? I am planning on requesting him to retain me on a pro-bono thingy as I genuinely like the direction my research has taken since I signed up with him 3 years ago!
Has anyone else encountered such a quandary?

What does your advisor suggest?

@JeffE My advisor is a very supportive but he is a little absent-minded at times when it comes to understanding the tribulations of international students.He hasn't had too many intl. students, he tends to overestimate the time that international students have. This leads to the student generally starting his job search a little late (It is recommended for international students to start their job search at least 4-6 months before graduation. This way once I graduate I either have a job lined up or at least I am not starting from scratch in the 90 days of unemployment that I am eligigle for)

4-6 months?  I generally recommend PhD students start their job search about 5-6 years before graduation.

@JeffE 5-6 years. Ok... As a foreigner that is quite impractical for me. I wouldn't even know where to start. Plus, I was unsupported and scrounging around. So... not really. That advice would probably work for domestic students but not really international students at my university at least.

The mechanics of the job search may only take 6 months, but getting a feel for your likely job market(s), establishing your reputation, making contacts with potential employers and/or letter-writers, and doing kick-ass research can never start too early. (And this is completely independent of differences between domestic and international students.)

Why not just bring up the idea of staying in your current lab with your advisor? Without mentioning money straight off the bat?
If your advisor claims it's not possible to keep you around due to funding, then you can mention that you would be willing to do it without payment. And if you are willing to do it for free — and if you're already trained and have a good relationship — I can't imagine she/he would say no.
On the other hand, keep pursuing other options. If you work out something else, neither your advisor nor anyone else is going have hard feelings (or any sense of shock or surprise) if you leave for gainful employment.


text:
How to balance application for a faculty position between exceptional and ordinary?
Following the opposite factors described in answers to the question What makes securing faculty positions difficult?, I came to conclusion that an application for an academic position should be balanced. It is understandable that there is a high competition for faculty positions, and a qualified applicant may be not even invited for interview; thus, everyone tries to even overestimate his/her achievements.
However, the interesting points in answers to the above-mentioned question was that too good application might scare the committee, then preferring not to take a risk. Thus, an exceptional application will be simply ignored.
In addition to obvious evidences in the CV, how to highlight exceptional features in the cover letter? For example, potential research achievements, which are not obvious in the CV, promising plans, etc.
Or the strategy must be in this direction to convince the committee that this superstar applicant is a good chance for your department!

how to highlight exceptional features in the cover letter?  — Nobody reads cover letters.  I think you mean your research and teaching statements.

@JeffE what about an administrative role such as department chair or dean? Then, there is no research and teaching statements, but a cover letter stating administrative experiences and abilities.

I was on the committee for with my department's last head search.  Yes, applicants most definitely submitted research  statements, along with other statements describing their service/administrative experience and their vision for the department/field.  I don't remember if there were cover letters.

@JeffE then it would be useful if you post an answer describing your experience for dealing with exceptional cases (as quoted on the question). Real experiences can reveal vague points in this issue (whether being too good is bad?)

One non-surprising way to help your application rise to the top is to have your advisor or another letter-writer contact a colleague they know at a school you're interested in and give you a good word in person (obviously not always an option).
If you are really in the position where you are "too good," then you should follow the advice in the other thread you mentioned, and explicitly spell out in your cover letter why you want to work at a particular institution.

Your first paragraph stated a very subtle and important issue. This means that personal trust is still more effective than formal documents.


text:
How do I cite or reference code that has not been officially published?
Let's say I go to someone's website, look up the source and use some of the JavaScript idea/pattern/code that is not a part of the wider framerwork/something similar, but a unique code that was written by the author of the website.
If it's not officially published in e.g. some coding tutorial, but I looked up the source of the website, is it appropriate to reference directly to the code on that website? (e.g. http://example.com/someonesscript.js)
Small edit #1: Just to mention, I have extensively edited the script, it is still similar, but not the same. It is about 100% longer, but there are similarities.

Whether you can take code from someone's website and modify it for your own purposes, also depends on the license that governs that piece of code. Ideally, the license would be stated somewhere in the file, but that is not always the case and in those cases the safe assumption is that the code is under a license that does not allow you to use and modify it.

If it is part of the website or a webpage, simply refer to the webpage in your references. It clearly mentions that you are referring to a code which is published on a website.
Just look at this structure for a Chicago styled reference:

Last Name, First Name. "Page Title." Website Title. Web Address
  (retrieved Date Accessed).

You can produce your citation like this:

Code Producer's Last Name, Code Producer's First Name. "Sample computing source code for idea/pattern/code." Website Title. Web Address
  (retrieved Date Accessed).

is it possible that getting into the source of the website and using someone's javascript partly for anything could considered as stealing?

@redCodeAlert I think that is another question and can not be asked and answered in the comments. Please make sure that your question is on-topic to Academia and then ask it. If your question is off-topic here, please consider viewing other StackExchange websites and find an appropriate one to ask your question.

I meant stealing in terms of academic substitute e.g. plagiarism

@redCodeAlert I understand. I suggest your newer question can be titled as: Is it considered plagiarism if I refer to the source code of a website in my paper?


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How to handle plagiarism on method that does not affect outcome results when reviewing a paper?
I was reviewing a paper related to my field (computational fluid dynamics) a while ago and, while reading a part of the methodology section where the numerical scheme and the equations were explained, I had a weird sense of déjà-vu. Regretfully, I found out that the author had plagiarized about three to four paragraph from a paper published two years ago. What was even crazier is that the author had plagiarized me, since the paragraph he had copied were from a paper I actually had previously published, thus explaining the feeling of déjà-vu.
I obviously noted that in my review and in my message to the editor, but I did not reject the paper directly. I acted this way since it was in the methodology section and related to mathematical formulas and really did not affect the outcome of the result. Was I in the wrong? Should such small plagiarism warrant instant rejection or is it sufficient to point them out and let the editor deal with that?

If they stole your paragraphs, it's possible they stole something else as well, you just didn't see it because it was from more obscure papers. Don't assume that plagiarism is small, it could be just the tip of the iceberg

When I saw "small unimportant plagiarism" I thought you were referring to a clause in a sentence. Three to four paragraphs is not small, unimportant plagiarism.

@aeismail Although there is some importance to context. If it's something like "The Navier-Stokes equations are "..." where rho is the fluid density, u is the fluid velocity ... then it's slightly more understandable. Then again, if that's managed to reach 4 paragraphs, then the paper might have other problems.

Something strange about this question, why plagiasmi is detected after going to reviewr and not before? are plagiasm cheker programs unrealible?

@SSimon I don't think journals commonly use them.

Was at least your paper cited in the very near to those paragraphs? Like "stollen text or copied text"[ref]. This would moderate the story. ... Besides this copying word to word part of others work is plagiarism regardless of the importance/extent of the material. It strongly points to other issues with the paper that other hypothetical referees might spot as you did. It happened to me to find my paragraphs of a review in a huge review. .. I was laughing about it but my at that time supervisor contacted editors and all coauthors....

@xLeitix In direction of initial assesment of one famoust publisher is similarity check before going to editor, before going to peer review. I am suprised with this question and something wrong is here, in my understanding  of peer review process and 3 biggest publishers

Really, how many ways are there to explain a numerical scheme, without channeling the ghost of James Joyce and making the explanation unreadable?

I must add that it was really related to the formulation of the equations and of the model. So some sentences really were like : where $\rho$  is the density, $p$ the pressure, etc. Others were not, but nothing was related to the results, only to the mathematical formulation / the methodology.

@jamesqf I think if Blab explained it well the first time you should just reference his/her explanation "... the numerical scheme devised by Blab...".  If Blab butchered the explanation then you should come up with a better explanation.

If the authors are non-native English speakers you might be more tolerant, because they may not have the skills necessary to tweak the sentences while keeping the same meaning.  If they're native speakers this is just lazy, though.  Or... is it possible the authors include a co-author of yours on the earlier paper?

@aeismail I interpret their meaning as not affecting the outcome results. I've changed the title according to that. Hope I guess it right

@DSVA also in RSC and ACS they check for similarity before sending to reviewers, so IDK, kinda strange question

@Joe So taking a few paragraphs and just tweaking sentences and keeping the same meaning is not plagiarism?  Also, should you really be more tolerant of someone doing something wrong because doing it right is a bit harder for them?

@BrentHackers  If you don't want to directly quote from someone else's work, you need to do more than "tweaking".  That's called close paraphrasing.  You need to put it fully into your own words.  And whether you put someone else's ideas into your own words or quote them directly, you still need to cite your source.

@BrentHackers How many ways can you describe a mathematical formula?  Also, imagine a non-native speaker trying to take those sentences and paraphrase them without screwing up and giving a meaning he didn't intend.  Third, academic reviewers (good ones) should be helping other authors to improve their work, not looking for excuses to report them to the authorities.  OP told the editor but didn't ask for the author's heads... seems like a fair and reasonable action.

@Joe So quote the guy you're taking the formula from

Seems like a good thing to suggest in the review.

There is no such thing as unimportant plagiarism.  And three to four stolen paragraphs is not small.
You did the right thing to report it to the editor.  But I also would have rejected the paper.  There is no place in academia for academic misconduct.  It certainly shouldn't be published.

Once plagiarism has been detected (in this instance it was detected with certainty, since the reviewer's own work was plagiarised), should one immediately reject on this basis? Or continue reviewing regardless?

@user2768 - one should immediately reject and inform the editor.There is not point in proceeding further.

Similar to how I read the first 2 sentences of this post and had the almost word-for-word thought as expressed in this answer...

Technically, reviewers do not reject papers. They recommend rejection to the editor.

@JonCuster If the paper is rejected, it will be resubmitted somewhere else, where the plagiarism might not be noticed. Wouldn't it be better to inform the editor of the plagiarism and request revision to remove the plagiarized material?

@DmitrySavostyanov When I first wrote my answer, I said I'd recommend rejection.  While technically more correct, I decided it sounded wishy-washy, like I wasn't sure whether it should be rejected.  I'm sure.

@JonCuster (a) That's the other journal's problem, not yours. (b) If they're careless and publish, you can alert them, likely forcing them to retract the paper and get more serious about their review process.

If the paper adds to science, it should be published once free of plagiarism.

It is not for a reviewer to decide whether the plagiarism has actually happened and whether the paper has to be rejected because of it. This is the editor's call. However, it is reviewer's duty to note the similarity and express concerns about possible plagiarism to the editor, supported by  evidence.
Plagiarism is a serious breach of academic integrity and should not be tolerated. The amount of the copied text is not really relevant here:  authors should not pass someone else's words and work as their own, however big or small it is. If the text was borrowed, it should've been properly attributed. This is not about the validity of result, but about the principles on which the academic community stands.

I this instance, it is known that plagiarism has actually happened, since the author plagiarized the reviewer's work.

In addition, according to the OP, it seems even if it had not been their work, it was said to be copied implying verbatim plagiarism, which is beyond argument.

I dont know dmitry, something fishy here, all papers I know have plagiasm chaker before sending to reviewrs, I am kinda sceptical to this question. or Am I wrong?

@user2768 You are right. My point is - even if OP was in doubt about the plagiarism, it is not the reviewer's call to make. The reviewer's task is to attract editor's attention and suggest action, not to make the final decision.

@SSimon The plagiarism checkers are computer tools which have to be operated and double-checked by people. A lot of journals, including some famous once, do not have enough staff to check all submissions, and delegate the task to reviewers.

are you saying Turnitin and similarity check is unrealible? @DmitrySavostyanov ? my uni pays a lot of money for subscription, knowing publisher profit margins I am ssuprised.

@SSimon They compute a measure of similarity using a formula. The calculation is reliable, but the formula itself is not a fundamental law of life, just an estimate. It is well known that these tools can generate false positives and false negatives. One can't rely solely on them.

but @DmitrySavostyanov OP stated that whole paragraph were stolen. I think you refer to small casses, this case here in OP question discribed is HUGE

"however big or small it is" there must be a lower limit, otherwise nobody could use any words that are in a dictionary. There must be a minimum number of words that should not be considered plagiarism :)

@DavidPostill Plagiarism is passing someone else's work as your own. It is not about the number of similar words or sentences, it is about the fact that they were used from another source without reference. Occasional match, even large, is not a plagiarism. Intentional failure to cite the source is.

@user2768: No, we don't know for sure that plagarism happened.  When you write things like "where $\rho$ is the density, $p$ the pressure" (which I copied from a comment above :-)), there are only a few ways, possibly only one, to write concisely and understandably, especially in scientific fields where phrasing is often formal and stereotyped.  Calling something like what this appears to be "plagiarism" is just plain nuts, headed for a reductio ad absurdum where every single formula, even every single word, has to be cited.

@DmitrySavostyanov that is why this question doesnt have sense, because such abig copies would be detected by plagiarism checker

Regarding unimportant plagiarism, I have to note that sometimes plagiarism is unintentional. Last year, we submited a paper to a top-tier conference, where we accidentally plagiarised two sentences from a paper of the program chair (who we were pretty sure that were also one of the reviewers). The paper was still accepted to be published.
That program chair published a well-known paper 10 years ago, which formalized a model, and proposed a naive algorithm (brute-force) to compute some entities on this model. The approach was demonstrated on some toy programs, written in a toy language, with a couple lines of code.
We were the first, in 10 years, to propose a practical algorithm for this model, which scales to thousands of line of Java. Of course, all of us read that paper countless times, and discussed it for several months. As a result, many of its sentences stuck in our heads, and somehow made their way to our paper. Notably, two sentences were exactly identical, since they described the settings for the problem.
One of the reviewers, whose review only appeared after the rebuttal phase, explicitly said that he did not read technical details, and only wanted to give editorial comments. So we were almost sure that he was the program chair.
That reviewer was extremely upset about our discussion in the related work, since we only compared our algorithm with the naive brute-force, and he felt we did not give credit to the model that we implemented (we formalized the model in a different way). In particular, he pointed out those two sentences that we lifted verbatim from that well-known paper, as a proof of the influence of his paper to ours.
But that didn't result in a rejection, and it was not a conditional acceptance, i.e. they didn't review our paper again.

It seems like it would be harder to explain 3-4 entire paragraphs as accidental. Anyone with that level of eidetic memory should also be able to remember where they read it.

I think that you did the right thing. I believe that some unimportant parts can be copied and a limited amount (certain percentage) of plagiarism is unavoidable. If the author wants to refer the same thing which is included in your paper, it makes no sense to change the wording a little so that it doesn't get caught in plagiarism issues. If the majority of the work that the author presents is original and not published before, then copying a small amount of essential details should be acceptable. How large were the 3 or 4 paragraphs and did they really capture the essence of the whole paper are the questions, which only you can answer. The gist of what I want to say is that if the author has presented a new, novel and an original idea, which has not been published before then a small amount of copying must not matter. These are my personal views. Of course, you can refer it to the editor with your views on it and let him deal with it in whatever way he finds it appropriate

If another paper's description of a concept is good, and doesn't need to be tailored to the publication at hand to support the novel elements it presents, then the source material can be explicitly quoted with a citation. Honestly, I wish large quotations of stock background material were more broadly accepted practice, as it would spare a lot of effort rewriting these descriptions over and over.

@Novelocrat “Before continuing here, consult [Reed, Tehfu, King, Man et al. 1743] as a general introduction to the subject”...

@leftaroundabout I cannot find that can you send me in pm?

@SSimon There's no such thing as a PM on this site.

really> it is called private chat @wizzwizz4

@SSimon Which can only be set up by moderators, and though it can be used as a PM feature isn't really one. In addition, it should only be used for purposes of moderation, not for sharing information that others might want as well (such as a link to a paper).

@wizzwizz4 post paper on that

@SSimon Erm... I don't think there are any papers discussing this, but I found this mSE answer. If that helps.

You can also tell the authors that entire paragraphs are just copy and paste work from ref (your work) and this is detrimental to the overall paper as it might even open discussion about plagiarism. You think that they can easily rephrase the methods section.
They will suspect it is you as likely just the original author can recognise that. But they shall be grateful for ever as you didn't rejected as well as you didn't start a big unpleasant issue. It is likely a lazy young that will likely take the lesson.

I agree with others that this is not a small act of plagiarism. With that said, it's hard for you to identify the motive behind it. What if they had copied it as placeholder material with the intent of replacing it later or properly citing it, and simply forgot?
I agree with you that it should not have been immediately rejected, but not because I view it as minor plagiarism. Instead, the results of their research have the potential to contribute to science. By rejecting it on the merits of the author instead of the merits of the research, you could be doing more harm than good for science. The issue of plagiarism should be addressed some different way; for example, by the editor notifying the author's institution so that they can handle the issue, which will be better equipped to determine why the plagiarism occurred. If it becomes a recurring issue, then the editor can consider simply blacklisting the author from submitting in the future.

@dan1111 Let's assume there are other issues. If they're allowed to resubmit, then the editor can apply extra scrutiny because they are aware of the previous issue. But if they're rejected, the author simply might just submit to a different publication, which probably won't be aware of the previous issue and be less thorough in looking for others. There is literally no advantage to that. The misconduct should be handled by the institution

I think you should reject it until the plaigiarism is corrected then if all else is good it can then be published.
The correct example should be set - this should be a simple correction for the author.

I'm not sure how one "corrects" plagiarism.  We do not, e.g., allow students who've been caught plagiarizing to resubmit without the plagiarism for a regrade, so why should the standards for a journal be more lax?  If you reject a paper for plagiarism, I think it should remain rejected.

Can you also "correct" the act of stealing by giving the item back to the owner and go free?

@NicoleHamilton  The paper of a student only has value as an assessment:  generally no one cares about the results except that they demonstrate that the student has learned the material.  The paper of an academic could be very important despite having some plagiarized material.  What if Einstein's ``Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper'' had a plagiarized paragraph?  Should it be rejected forever?  I agree that the academic should be punished in some way, but we should not necessarily discount their discovery.

What about "not stealing" but act of finding abandoned think which they failed to find owner. In this case they may find the paragraphs in some internal not referenced drafts and didn't check literature whether it was published by somebody real. And if it is not important related to published results, then it's up to editor whether to accept revision with correction.

So, the general opinion is that any person caught plagiarising needs to be flogged at the stake, hung then drawn and quartered.... And whatever the discovery it should be lost, buried and not used...

@SolarMike  Basically, yes.  It is the kiss of death in academia.  It is important to know that so you don't do it.

@StevenGubkin  People like Einstein don't plagiarize.  It's pretty much the definition of plagiarism that the work isn't that original so it's unlikely to be all that great a loss if it's never published.  Sooner or later, someone honest will independently discover and publish the same stuff.

@TJK  Passing off someone else's work as your own is plagiarism no matter where you found it.

@NicoleHamilton Plagiarism is plagiarism. But the cases are different - it could be intention, cheating or a terrible negligence.So the punishment should be different too; life sentence or a strong warning message.

Dear @NicoleHamilton I respect your rigorosity and thoroughness but this is not a case and practice Academia. Never was and never will be, however, this is the case for some US university and that is not relative to the whole world of academia, basically it is cultural relativism.

@NicoleHamilton Einstein was accused of it! he copied work of his wife, also he didn't publish a lot of work, in today era he wouldn't be a productive member of the academic community, also OP pointed out it is in introduction not in style

@SSimon re: the plagiarism claim, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Extraordinary_claims_require_extraordinary_evidence I don't think that evidence exists.  re: productivity, Einstein's citation count of over 112,000 https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qc6CJjYAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao  looks productive to me.

@NicoleHamilton but his H index is only 60 my advisor has 80

@SSimon It's not often that an H index of 60 is referred to as "only 60".

@NicoleHamilton bcs it is ajusted for time if i understand formula for calculationj?


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Has anyone ever written a paper and put your name on it?
I am a professor and researcher in mathematics and my research is kind of on the theoretical side.  Online, I discovered a mathematician who had written some papers with ideas similar to mine, and we corresponded and discussed possible collaboration.  Then he wrote an entire paper, listing both of us as authors on the front page, and sent it to me.  I didn't think it ethical to take any credit for a paper I had no part in writing, so I discontinued all contact with this person.  Has anyone here had a similar experience?  How common is this?
I am becoming very disillusioned with the pure research game.  People spend huge amounts of time on self-promotion because there just isn't that much demand for their work.

I was with you till you got to "I didn't think it ethical to take any credit for a paper I had no part in writing, so I discontinued all contact with this person."
Why not just simply say what you wrote here and ask not to be included in the paper because of this reason?

Why not assuming good intentions? maybe he felt that your conversation was substantial for his result, and didn't want you to feel he is stealing your joint result? Why not just asking him to remove you as a co-author if you believe you didn't contribute enough?

@blackace + Ran G.  You have a point, and maybe I am assuming sinister motives where there are none.  Maybe I should just have just asked this person to remove my name from the paper.  But in fact our conversation was not substantial for his/her result, and what this person did was pretty strange.  I'll consider contacting him/her.

I am the first author, because alphabetical order, on a paper to which I contributed some data and some discussion, but no writing.  Nothing sinister there.  (I did ask to have my name removed, but the other authors said they couldn't have written it without my collaboration and left my name on.)

I bumped into this quite a bit when collaborating interdisciplinarily, especially involving someone from the mathematical world. I know mathematicians make assumptions all the time, but in this case, why not ask a simple question? A simple and common-sense question would significantly clarify the situation.

Without knowing too many details of your situation, could you perhaps give the other author the benefit of the doubt? Cutting off all contact does seem harsh (unless you have other reasons) for what could simply be a misunderstanding.
I don't know the conventions of your field, but it seems in many science fields that authors are added if they contribute intellectual ideas on the research, not necessarily for doing the research. Other authors simply add support in some fashion, so get added. It is not uncommon to have many authors on a science paper. It does in fact get tricky because one can offend others by not including co-authors.
I'm of the opinion that it's probably better to include someone who contributed in some fashion than not include them. You could argue that this dilutes research and is a "pure research game", but honestly, one paper is not going to make or break anyone's career.
Could this author simply have been trying to extend kindness, or perhaps thought you had a bigger role in the research than you actually felt you did?

Thanks for your comment.  I will reconsider my decision and maybe contact him/her and request him/her to remove my name from the paper.  This person wrote the whole thing and it would simply be wrong for me to take any credit. But we have some shared interests, and might be able to produce some real collaboration.

People in math tend to be pretty honest about writing papers and don't claim to be authors merely for "lending support".  It is rare for a math paper to have more than 3-4 authors.  In some other fields, I have heard that a paper can have a dozen authors, some of whom participated indirectly at best.

contribute intellectual ideas on the research, not necessarily for doing the research — In some theoretical fields, there is little or no difference between "contributing intellectual ideas" and "doing the research".  And I do not mean that disparagingly.

To answer your stated question: the only general requirement for your authorship on a paper is that you contribute to the research significantly, and that generally doesn't imply co-writing it — contributing to the ideas can be significant, especially if the proof becomes trivial with an idea you contributed. (I've heard mathematicians describe "significant contribution" very differently — say, that PhD students are expected to draft papers, get advising and feedback from their supervisor, and not list their supervisor as coauthor — unless the student failed to contribute to the project).
Now, you have similar ideas. In my experience, tracking down who originated an idea among people who did work together can be very hard, and joint credit can be an easier solution which is accepted in our community (in Computer Science, Programming Languages).
However, since all authors are jointly responsible for the claims in the paper, I've been taught it's very bad style to add somebody to a draft without his permission; submitting the paper without your knowledge/consent would be unethical, but dropping contact is not only brisk, but ambiguous. Couldn't he genuinely (in good faith) think you were okay with the draft, but didn't have time to respond?
In fact, if he thinks you contributed to the research, to publish it ethically, he'll need either your agreement to have your name in, or your agreement to have your name out.

You were completely wrong in thinking it was unethical to co-author a paper you had no part in writing, or that the other person did anything wrong. Quite the contrary.
Contributions to papers may take very different form; one can merit a co-authorship without writing a word if one contributed essential ideas. As a famous example, Adelman of the RSA code fame did not participate in inventing the code; what he did was defeating dozens of previous attemps by Rivest and Shamir. When they came up with a proposal he could not defeat, they included him as a co-author.
By doing what they did, your correspondent simply acknowledged that discussions with you helped him to solve the problem, in which case it is customary to offer a co-authorship. Of course, you might feel differently, e. g., that you only communicated common knowledge, in which case it would be appropriate to decline the offer. But from other side, it was just new to them; how could they judge whether it's common knowledge or your unique perspective or the result of you thinking on this problem specifically? For them, it's only ethical to make sure they don't err on the wrong side of it.

Sorry, but a person's consent is required before you include them as an author. Required

@Buffy, nothing prevents me from typesetting an article, including whomever I deem right as an author and sending the result to them. Nothing. The consent is required before I submit the article to a journal or make it public, but nothing in the OP indicates that ever happened.

You can send it to them, but not to a journal or conference without their consent as you say. But the first sentence of your answer clearly implies something else.

It implies what it says: by typesetting a draft, including the OP's name on it, and e-mailing it to the OP, the other person did nothing wrong.


text:
How to fund a 2nd master's degree (UK), or should I directly go for a PhD?
I will receive my master's degree soon. Even though it was a nice program, I found out I'm more interested in something else. Now, I'm thinking should I do another MSc (one-year) in the other field before starting a PhD? The MSc program I'm interested in is given in the UK. I think (hope) I'm so good a student, that they would happily take me in.
Well, then there comes the question how to fund the 2nd master's degree.. In general, are master's degrees (fully) funded in the UK? I'm european if that matters. I would also appreciate if you can point me to grant-providing institutions.

What exactly are the field of your current MSc and the one you're considering? Do you actually need to do the new MSc in order to get the PhD place?

In general there is no funding available for MSc courses in the UK. In some cases there are 1+3 courses (i.e., a 1 year MSc and a 3 year PhD) where the MSc course is funded, but in general this is not the case.
One benefit of this is that the admissions criteria for MSc courses are pretty low. Essentially anyone with a 2i or higher degree classification can find a program willing to accept them.

Are you sure that EU (but non-UK) nationals pay a higher course fee? I would think that that is not allowed under EU regulations. See e.g. http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/education/university/fees-and-financial-help/index_en.htm

Do you know if MPhil is ever funded in the UK, or is it comparable to MSc?

@PieterNaaijkens you appear to be correct that there is no difference in fees. I am still learning about the UK system. I believe, but I cannot find any documentation, that home and EU MSc students cost my department different amounts of money.


text:
How to manage and differentiate literature reviews for different papers with related subject?
I wrote a research paper on a given topic. And now I'm writing a continuation for the same research. My question are :

How to include the literature review of the previous paper in the current paper while avoiding plagiarism?
How to differentiate the current literature review from the previous one?

When was the first paper published ? Are there papers of related subject written by other authors published after you published your first paper ?

The first paper is still in review by the journal.
Yes, new papers with related subjects were published  by other authors recently.

First, it is absolutely acceptable to have significant overlap (in terms of content) between the two literature reviews. Of course, you need to avoid plagiarism. The best solution is to rewrite the literature review from scratch. By doing this, you can also reassess if all content from the original review is needed in the new paper and whether the order in which you present information makes sense for the new paper (but see below).
To distinguish the new from the original literature review, there are several things to address:

Most importantly, include a brief review of your first paper to highlight what was found there and use this to highlight why an additional paper is needed.
Your continuation will address questions not covered by your first paper. Make sure to include sufficient background on these new questions in your new literature review.
Add any relevant information that was published since your first paper.

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


text:
Talking to my supervisor about leaving the lab
My supervisor is really toxic. She has been yelling at me for every lab meeting and getting angrier by the day, due to which I am subjected to immense anxiety and panic attacks mad severe depression. So much so that I have decided to leave the project after 3 years of work.  I know that she is going to get really angry after getting to know this. How can I put forth the mental health issues in a way that she is at least a little bit convinced by my reason to leave?

This sounds like an awful situation. I'm very sorry! Does your department have an academic who is in charge of the PhD programme? Or do you have a "mentor" (someone who is neither involved in your research nor in the assessment of your work). Either of those may be able to advise.

Do you think it is better that I inform her first rather than getting a third party involved without her knowledge?

This very much is situation-dependent. But if you believe that she would just "get really angry" in such a conversation and that this would further negatively affect your mental health, I would advise to get third-party support first.

Do you need her approval to quit? I don't think there is any way to communicate to a toxic person that you are leaving (and the reason is her) in a way that she will not be angry. But it also matters little.

I don't need her approval. I am employed at the university hospital so even if I tell her that I quit it will be sufficient ideally as my contract is coming to an end in January. This discussion would be to let them know that there isn't a need to extend my contract further.

There are people who will not be reasoned with. They will not be convinced. They do not negotiate. Understand one thing: Unless you endangered lives (in which case, I could see a case for yelling), and I assume it's not, it is not your fault. Period. In the end, it's just yelling and you are leaving. Don't give her control over you by discussing your exit. You have decided. That's your decision to make, she has no say in that. Understand: you have decided. If she catches you and yells, you have decided. Think: "You have no power here". But if you don't have to tell her, why bother?

You shouldn't care if she gets angry. Also I think you don't need to give her a detailed explanation or even convincing if you don't want. If you already decided to leave, just follow the administrative process (which often does not require you to make contact with her) to finish your contract/project through the school/employer.
Remember that your health is first, and no profesional goal or the opinion of anyone should comprimise that. She was in a position of power before. Now that you are leaving she has no more power over you. Don't worry and take care of yourself.

All of the suggestions help a lot! Thank you all!


text:
What did Israel Gelfand mean by “You have to be fast only to catch fleas,” in the context of mathematical research?
I'm confused about a statement by Israel Gelfand
given in the book TOPSY TURVY: A Book for All in One  Page  No:155
Why did  Israel Gelfand  say “You have to be fast only to catch fleas,”
and how does this phrase apply to researchers?

This quote basically implies you can be slow for "big results" but I'm not really sure it's accurate anymore except in some exceptional cases like Fermats Last Theorem. The quantity of papers coming out continues to grow. Doing any type of original work is becoming increasingly difficult for every field.

@FourierFlux Ah, but the questions considered and our toolboxes also continue to grow.  I'm not convinced that research is getting more difficult---it's always been hard---though how people do research has changed.

"Unless your objective is catching fleas, you dont need to worry about being fast"

It would be useful if you can give more of the context preceding the quote, for the benefit of those of us who don’t have this book.

Also the book you are quoting seems like a book of random quotes, some of them mis-translated, misappropriated or taken out of context.

No, in the past you could make a successful career by focusing on one area but that is close to finished. Modern mathematics is pretty much a perfect example, pure analysts are coming to an end. Maybe experimental areas you can still specialize but most of the classic subjects have been pretty much exhausted.

To me, at least, the metaphor seems clear. Anyone can pick up pennies off the street, but it takes hard work and time to amass a fortune. Hmmm. Another metaphor.
If you want to make a reputation publishing trivial (or small) results, then you have to be fast, since they are available to most mathematicians in a subfield. But if you want to do great things (catch bears, for example), it will take time and effort. It will, necessarily be slower and that is ok as the results are more profound.
The word "only" in the quote is very important. Yes, you need to be fast to catch small, fleeting, things, but only for that. Without that word, the meaning would be entirely different.
Gelfand, of course, is known for some pretty profound work. They didn't result from 3 week research projects.
And, this is only my speculation, since he can't be asked directly.

Just to add that this is quite a common expression in Russian, and the gist is essentially correct: no need to rush, we aren't hunting fleas here.

No, I don't think that's quite the same meaning.  I'd say "You only have to be fast to catch fleas" as in, if you want to catch fleas, you have to be fast with the implication being that if you want to catch something bigger, speed is less important.

Inferring from this and my language knowledge, it might be (for a better result the original quote is needed) the counterpart of the English saying "Nothing must be done hastily but killing of fleas." But the Russian counterpart means to me merely "don't be in haste", "don't rush things".

Is the original Russian sentence really with "fleas" and not "flies", which would sound more natural in my view?

@Federico, no, "fleas" sounds better in Russian, although the two words are just as close. But the main difference is that it's practical: nobody really catches flies by hand: there are better methods. Whereas catching fleas was common (well, still is: I recently caught a flea on my dog), and you need to be really quick before it jumps off and disappears (as is well known, fleas are record jumpers with respect to their size).

The word order in the question is in fact the most appropriate one, but the contrapositive might convey the literal meaning more clearly: "You do not need to be fast for any reason other than to catch fleas".  If instead the quotation were "You only need to be fast to catch fleas" then the most ready interpretation would be that speed is sufficient for flea catching.

This is just speculation, but as a native Russian speaker, I'm pretty sure this is a literal translation of a Russian saying, better translated as "You only need haste when catching fleas" (Спешка нужна только при ловле блох). Since Israel Gelfand had lived in USSR, I think it's pretty likely he was referencing it.
It's pretty much a generic "haste makes waste" proverb that means you shouldn't rush and that you should think before doing something.

I would vote this answer up if you could convince me with a citation or two that this information is correct.

@MatthewChristopherBartsh No citations are required to offer an example of an aphorism popular in some part of the world. This is for the same reason that 0 is the minimum sample size required to be statistically certain that at least 50% of Americans over the age of 30 have eaten ice-cream at least once in their lifetime. I mean, you could round up 10,000 people, ask them a yes or no question (have you eaten ice-cream before?), assume that there is an underlying binomial distribution, etc... define a null and alternative hypothesis, report a p-value, but that would all be a waste of time.

Not an answer, but another "catch a flea" quote from a mathematician.

In guessing a conundrum, or in catching a flea, we do not expect the
breathless victor to give us afterwards, in cold blood, a history of
the mental or muscular efforts by which he achieved success; but a
mathematical calculation is another thing.

Lewis Carroll
A Tangled Tale
Answers to Knot 4

I am only speculating, but the meaning in this context seems clear to me: "You only need to be quick about generating and publishing material when the material is relatively trivial." The implication is that you can take your time, not only not rushing, but even being somewhat slow, when you are generating momentous material, that is to say, solving big problems.
Furthermore, "fleas" may allude to opportunities to generate trivial new mathematical content in the form of minor nitpicks, adjustments, corrections, and additions to a recently published big breakthrough. These "fleas" are thus perhaps small spin-offs from recent breakthroughs that are easily seen by everyone. There may be an allusion to a woolly mammoth or other large animal, brought down by some great hunter, that has fleas on it. You would need to be quick if you are to catch one or more of them before they have been caught by other hunters.
I also get a sense that catching fleas is not something to be proud of.

"You have to be fast only to catch fleas" unfortunately (I just realized) could be taken to mean, instead, "You always need to be fast. Even to catch only fleas, you have to be fast" In the context of mathematical research, that would mean you always need to quickly publish results, even trivial ones. If Gelfand meant  "You don't have to be fast except to catch fleas", perhaps he should have said so, or "You only have to be fast to catch fleas".

I don't think this is accurate any more, unfortunately people are expected to come up even with big results with a reasonable amount of speed. Wiles and Fermat's Last Theorem is a bit of an exception if I remember rightly, as he was salami slicing and publishing intermediate results as separate papers on the way to the proof to give the illusion of productivity (see the book by Singh).
Edit: I am aware that Wiles was publishing important articles in this period and I am just paraphrasing his own words from an interview, but I appreciate that he was being modest/self-deprecating and simplifying what actually happened to make it understandable at a popular level.
I'm also interested in the extent to which this applies to scientific research and physics.  I guess it still applies but then there really is a race for results and sometimes time is of the essence.  In general a lot of emphasis is given towards those people that can make very quick (not necessarily non-trivial) extensions of other people's work or to come up with quick explanations of recent experimental results.
In physics, Einstein said he had no time for those physicists who 'find where the board is thin and drill lots of small holes' ie. he was interested in things which took a lot of thought and conceptual understanding rather than just choosing what looked to be an area with lots of quick results which can be obtained with relative ease and speed.

Looking over Wiles's publication record (as I did just now) does not bear out a claim of "salami slicing": in the period from 1986 to 1993 he has several papers that are really excellent in every sense (solving important problems, published in the best journals, with lots of citations...) If I remember correctly, what he said was that he had important results from before 1986 and he took his time writing them up.  That may be the case...or it may be that he was not being entirely serious.  Note that he dared to have no publications from 2008 to 2015.

But I agree with your first sentence, and I upvoted your answer.  What Wiles gets away with many years after he became one of the world's most celebrated mathematicians has little do with the pressures that other (especially younger) mathematicians face.

I am just paraphrasing something that he said himself in some interview (I think in the popular book by Singh).  I appreciate that this very much has to be taken with a pinch of salt, as he was simplifying a lot to get his point across in that interview.

As you say, he may just have been being self-deprecating or not totally serious.


text:
Should I introduce myself to my supervisor via e-Mail or set up an appointment to introduce myself?
For my graduate studies my supervisor was assigned to me without me having spoken to him first. Now I am wondering if I should introduce myself via e-Mail and then ask for an appointment, or keep it short and ask for an appointment specifically to introduce myself. I don't want to waste his time or appear rude.

Getting to know his students is not a waste of time of a supervisor. Don't overthink it!

Sort of depends what you mean by "introduce myself". It'd be weird to ask for an appointment without stating your name, but he doesn't need your life history.

I would send mail suggesting you think it might be helpful to meet, just to get to know each other, and ask if your supervisor might suggest a time that's convenient.

Personally, I'd recommend going to their office and introducing yourself in person. Ask if they've got a minute and, if not, arrange a later time to meet. They may, of course, be busy or absent when you go in which case I'd fall back to e-mail, and write something like:

Title: New MSc Student
Dear Dr. Chappy,
I am on MSc programme X, and I will be joining you to work on your
  project 'Project title' shortly. Could we arrange a time to meet up
  and discuss arrangements for this project, please?
In the meantime, I am keen to get started. Could you recommend any
  relevant papers for me to read before we meet?
Kind Regards,
User61635

Note that there are cultural differences in how you address professors so you may need to adopt a more formal tone in some countries.
Also, be aware that when you've arranged what you expected to be an informal chat your supervisor may have different ideas and launch into a detailed technical explanation of the project. I suggest you prepare for this. Finally, and this is a key point, if you don't understand anything he says stop them and ask for an explanation. Don't think you'll impress them by feigning knowledge you don't possess, you will do far better to ask questions early so you understand what the project is clearly.

Contact them -- be efficient.  The draft above leaves them plenty of room to respond as they wish.  And if they don't reply promptly,  wait a little and remind them.  They ask for a new supervisor - politely of course but they have job to do and if they don't do it, YOU will be the person in difficulties.

First of all, you should try to figure out what the typical course of action in your department is. For example, in our department, MSc students are also assigned to supervisors (both students and supervisors can have some influence on that process, but the principle is the same as it seems to be in your case: It's not primarily something between the prospective supervisor and the student, but between thesis coordinator (who assigns) and the student on the one hand and thesis coordinator and supervisor on the other hand.
In our case, students get an email from the coordinator laying out the further procedure. In particular, this email states that it's the student's responsibility to set up a meeting with the assigned supervisor within a given timeframe.
The supervisor will know that you have been assigned to them, so just emailing them to say essentially the same does not help much. Every supervision trajectory will have to start with some meeting, so it is most likely that this will be the first ``real'' contact you have. Depending on your department, it is either you (most likely, IMHO) or the supervisor (less likely, IMHO) who takes the initiative to set up the meeting.

You can write email to him, i would go like this
Respected Dr/Prof/xyz
As you may already know that i have been assigned to do my project work under your supervision. I feel honored and motivated and i am confident that under your supervision i will excel my skills and will be more productive.
I am really looking forward to meet you at any time convenient to you, so we can discuss further and i may start my graduate work.
Please suggest me the time and date for the meeting, and also advise me if there is any thing i should consider preparing for the meeting e.g. some proposal or articles etc.
thank you and i hope i will do well under your supervision.

Frankly, if I were the professor and I read "I have been assigned" (lower case I) and "thank you and i hope i will do" (no capitalization and lower case I), I would not be impressed at all.

Its not to be copied and pasted,  just an idea for have a look. And formal emails has to be drafted revised and approved before sending.

When you give an example of e-mail, please have it in proper English. Thanks.

Whenever I see something starting with "respected" I automatically assume it's academic spam. This example is too long! Make it short and to the point! Writing like this lowers the chances of the mail being read to zero.

Cultural norms differ between countries, so this language may be appropriate depending on which country our Questioner is in.


text:
Unhappy with my PhD program in my home country, thinking about applying to another university in UK
My problem is a bit unusual and I would love to get some advice…
I'm a first year PhD student in social-sciences and I already got my proposal approved. I moved back to my home country (where I am currently doing a PhD) after completing an undergraduate and an MSc. I am very unhappy here.
I would like to have a future as an academic. The only reason I decided to a PhD in my home country and not abroad was because I was determined to try, stay, and make it work here, but recently I been thinking it was a mistake. I am thinking more and more about discontinuing my program here and applying for doctoral studies in the UK, as a new student (after a bit of online research I found that they rarely accept a transfer and it is best to start as a new student).
I would love to get your thoughts regarding my situation,

I am considering sending an email to a potential supervisor but I am not sure how to explain why I want to drop-out of my current PhD program without talking my university down? How do you suggest I do that?
Did anyone had a similar experience or have some advice?

Can you clarify what types of problems you mean in your statement "no one to turn to in case of a problem"? I assume you have a PhD advisor. Also, can you clarify how far along you are in your research (i.e., halfway through data collection, analysis begun, analysis complete, dissertation half complete, etc.)?

if you feel that the program does not satisfy your expectations, do not waste your time. We only live once. Good years of PhD studentship is memorable, don't ignore and miss it.

Hi Eykanal. Yes, I do have a supervisor but that is it... When I said 'no one to turn to', I meant that, in case you have difficulty with your supervisor, there is no one you can talk to. The program is not really organised at my uni and the only thing you got is a supervisor... Currently I am collecting data and will be halfway through my data collection in, I believe, 6 months or less. I did not start the analysis or any writing.

This is, in my experience, quite common. Of course you will want to make sure you get good letters, so think about where those will come from. You don't want to say "I hate my current program" in your personal statement, so instead be sure to learn appealing, specific aspects of the programs you apply to, and describe them instead.

"Don't run, walk". You have a position now, that albeit bad, is not abusing you. Don't throw it away unless you have something better.

It happens that people change their PhD programs (I know a few.)
Basically what you lose is:

Time (usually you need to start from the scratch),
Relationship with advisor (the latter is not always the case).

If, for any reason, the first year was bad, it is rather unlikely that the next ones will be better (I have never met anyone who is enjoying PhD more and more with each year...). Moreover, if you don't like it, maybe your advisor does not like it either and eventually you won't be able to finish at all.
But beware - "grass is greener...". You can experience the same problems in other places. So here are the most important things:

What is not working?
Do you have any reasonable argument that in the target place such thing is better?

(Anyway - if you are very unhappy after one year (of 3-5 more years to come), then just change it to another PhD or to something different (don't disregard other careers). It's better to end up with "wasted" years or a "suboptimal" career than hanging on a tree.)
HOW to do that is a different question (or questions - because it involves both application to a new program and quitting your current one). See e.g.:

current PhD applicant applying to another university
Apply to PhD after expulsion from another
Switching from one area of graduate study to another?

I enjoyed my PhD more and more with each year (or at least, the first year was the worst and I tried to leave at that point, then it got better.)

PhD without challenge is meaningless,
Most of us don't know what is PhD until we are broken in like a baseball glove,
You will never escape politics in academia, in your household, and elsewhere.

You should re-evaluate if spending the next 4+ years of your life pursuing your studies is worth the effort; and if you have an actual desire to pursue your studies. There aren't many benefits, and the major contributing factor should be your interest in the subject matter, field/area, or potential position as faculty or other.
I think one year is not enough time to have an opinion, and by the time you are able to have one it will be too late to change!! Last thing you want to do is upset your PI, and odds are they will make you pay in the short or long run.
With that said, many frequently change labs due to advisors departure or other reason. You can certainly find a lab, but I think anyone would be concerned your jumping ship to their own, and want to bring your baggage too! There is such a thing as integrity, and it is uncommon for another advisor to pick up someone's project out of the blue as they are mostly concerned on their own.

+1 for clear points, but about your third item. There is a significant difference between academia affected or controlled by politics.

Everything is controlled by politics, personally I don't have to look outside my household to see that prevalent truth.. it's just a matter how you adapt and contribute to a slow change in a better direction.

Thank you for your answer. It is not my intention to have someone else pick up the same project. Rather, I intend to change the project but use some of the field work. Also, I understand that politics is everywhere and I can deal with that, but small change can't happen if your are forced to think somebody else's thoughts... Politics is different in closed societies and I might be able to foster more change if I'll have the support of an outside source (another university in another country), while researching my own country.

It seems you are coming out of the gates screaming that you disagree in the efforts of your PI. If so, it may be a good opportunity to stay (call me a sadist) or you should not have joined the lab vis a vis reading prior publications. I would not expect then for it to be ok to take your work from that PI, which belongs to s/he, and use it elsewhere. You may, however, do the research again if the new PI agrees it would be worthwhile. Maybe you can find a reason to move home, and justify you cannot stay away, and then proceed to apply to a new program, and careful to temper expectations.

-1 as the first two points advertise a long-term masochism (which is dangerous to one's psychical health). Sure, PhD is challenging and will contain a lot of frustration (unless someone a not-so-ambitiuous project), but if after one year someone is very unhappy, it may be devastating to proceed further, with life-long consequences (regardless whether finding another PhD is an option). Other points (e.g. 3.) are fine, though.

There are many reasons one might not want to do one's PhD studies in one's home country, especially if that country is in the third world.  It might have to do with a low level of academic rigor.  It might have to do with the culture shock one gets upon returning to one's native land after living abroad for some time.  It might have to do with feeling stifled by family, religion or culture.  It might have to do with violence and/or corruption.  I'm sure I left some possible reasons out.
Could you send out some feelers to a couple of universities that interest you, to start with?
I agree that you don't want to say anything insulting about your present institution (in writing).  You can get a lot across by writing with delicacy.  For example you could talk about seeking greater academic rigor, or looking for an institution where independent thought is highly valued.

+1 For seeking greater academic rigor, or looking for an institution where independent thought is highly valued. I think that's what the OP was looking for (without talking my university down).

If you are unhappy in the first year itself then you should change it. It is not rare these days. You should not see it as a bad move on your part. However when you go to another place, and if you keep the same attitude and complain again then it will be bad on your part. One advice, if you have already decided to change your PhD, then it would remove red flags if you could ask your referees and get a couple of lines in support of your decision written in your letter of recommendation.