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How to obtain US Bachelor degree based on my old university credentials?
I learned a math course in a Russian university many years ago. For silly discrimination and other silly reasons I didn't finish it and didn't receive any diploma.
Recently (2020 Oct 27) I have confirmed my education by the US standards: 100.50 semester hours of undergraduate credit, grade Point Average is 3.54 based on a 4-point scale with A=4, B=3, C=2, D=1, F=0.
I want to receive the US Bachelor in mathematics. What can I do? Can I do it without passing any additional courses/exams? How much may it cost?
Note that despite of having no funding and no access to libraries and scientific databases I did a very advanced math research (some of which is peer reviewed and published). Essentially, I am a PhD with lost diploma.

Marginally relevant: Pure maths “dropout” wanting to finish MSc thesis

No real US university will award a degree to a student who has not taken any courses at that university.  What you want is not possible.
To award a degree, you must earn credits from the university.  Typically, this is at least half the total credits required for the degree.

"No real US university will award a degree to a student who has not taken any courses at that university." Why do the devil servants behave this way?

@porton Because a university degree is a certification by the university that the holder of that degree has certain knowledge.  The way the university makes certain of that is by requiring students to take and pass their courses before awarding degrees.  By the way, calling people "devil servants" is not likely to make them want to help you.

@BobBrown By the way no human (except of my girlfriend) thinks about helping me anyway, so how could it harm?

@porton  I note that three people who have never met you have attempted to help you with the question you asked.

@BobBrown They exactly admitted that they could not help me.

Recently (2020 Oct 27) I have confirmed my education by the US standards: 100.50 semester hours of undergraduate credit

A typical diploma in the US is 120 semester hours. So, you're a bit short.
Be aware, however, that each school will make its own determination as to which classes can be transferred. Typically, they will look at the syllabus and determine which classes are comparable (this may be difficult in your case). So it is not at all guaranteed that a given school will count all 100 hours.
Further, virtually all schools have a "residence requirement." Even if they agree that all 100 hours are equivalent, they may not allow you to transfer more than, say, 90 hours. The thinking is that if you are going to earn a degree from University X, you should take a significant number of classes at University X. Otherwise, students could do all their coursework at school X and get the degree from school Y.
Finally, note that there are usually "distribution requirements" -- despite your plans to major in math, you will have to take classes in many subjects to earn a degree. I do not know whether this is also true in the Russian system.

How much may it cost?

Thirty credits would probably cost about $10,000. This will vary hugely depending on the school you attend and the financial aid you qualify for.

Note that despite of having no funding and no access to libraries and scientific databases I did a very advanced math research (some of which is peer reviewed and published).

Understood, but unfortunately it is difficult to convert non-University work into a degree. On the other hand, some employers might (wisely) overlook the lack of a degree.

What can I do?

If finishing the degree at the Russian institution is still possible, that would probably be fastest and cheapest. Failing that, I would look for a reputable, local university with a generous policy on transfer credits. Other answers have also suggested some accredited online schools; this may be a good option as well.

"If finishing the degree at the Russian institution is still possible, that would probably be fastest and cheapest." I have a big conflict with Russia, so learning in Russia (and the only option would be to start paid studies from the first year) may probably be impossible or even dangerous. In fact, I deprived Russia of economic and military might: I did a fundamental scientific discovery and I am so much hated that they will be likely unable to cite my research, so a component in Russian education and science will be missing, leading to stop of the entire system. They may be offended.

By the way, I am almost sure I have been noticed by Putin when I told about my situation: He many times hinted (or were it not Putin but a spirit speaking through him?) that I am welcome to Russia. He forgot to give me email to write to and to pay for the air tickets, etc. Finally, I decided to try to cut the knot and told about their situation, harshly mocking the Russian way in a letter to Putin. Putin has recently reacted by splitting citizens to "ours" (and therefore "not ours") and advertising drinking alcohol to separate non-drinkers from "ours". Yes, it is silly.

While the accepted answer to the question is almost universally true, Excelsior College is a non-profit, regionally-accredited institution whose primary mission is to help students complete their degrees.  They don't offer a degree in mathematics, but may allow you to obtain a degree that would permit you to enter a U.S. graduate program.  If you are able to get an official transcript from your former institution, Excelsior College might be able to help.

I think, it is of little utility for me. I have already started a computer science study in UoPeople online university, it costs me one time $60 and $20 or $37 per course. (Yes, it is a real university in the sense that they do teach advanced topic and assess students strictly enough, so their degree would be reasonably counted valuable.) I see no reason why Excelsior College would be better: the most suitable course there seems to be Bachelor of Science in Information Technology and I don't see how it would be better than the courses I have started to take recently.

I viewed their website and it appears they do require courses and/or exams.  So this does not seem to answer the question.

@AnonymousPhysicist  Of course, you are right in both your comment and your accepted answer.  My own answer is in aid of helping OP achieve his apparent goal of a recognized U.S. degree.  I'm going to leave it in case it is of help to others in the future.

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What year to use when citing second editions of books
This seems like a silly question, but I can't find a clear answer online. If Dr. Brainiac's Big Book of Science was first published in 1974, but I have the second edition, published in 1996, should I cite it as (Brainiac, 1974) or (Brainiac, 1996)?
I realise that this is the sort of thing that might come down to the policy of the journal, but it happens that the journal I'm submitting to doesn't offer any specific guidelines on this particular topic, so I was wondering what the standard practice is, if there is one.
edit: for clarity, of course I would mention in the references section that I was referring to the second edition. I guess it would look something like this:
Brainiac, Q. Big Book of Science. Aperture publishing, 1974. (2nd edition 1996.)
or
Brainiac, Q. Big Book of Science, 2nd edition. Aperture publishing, 1996. (First published 1974.)
Where in the first case the in-text citation should be (Brainiac, 1974), and in the second it would be (Brainiac, 1996). The question is which of these is considered the best, or at least the most usual, way of doing it.  In my particular case I'm citing a specific fact that is almost certainly in both editions, but of course I can't be sure.

If the journal uses the American Psychological Association (APA) style, then you cite the year of the edition and you do not mention earlier editions.
For example, if you are using the 4th edition (published in 1994) of the APA publication manual, you would cite it as (American Psychological Association, 1994) and its bibliographic entry would be:
American Psychological Association. (1994). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (4th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

Thanks - it's not an APA style journal (it has its own style guidelines that are not the same as the APA ones and which don't mention this issue) but it's good to know that APA have an official position all the same.

In this case I would say Be Honest: only cite the references that you have read. Even if you have read the "rev 1", you might be (wrongly) citing as "rev 2" a sentence from "rev 1" that was removed in "rev 2"...
It might be obvious, but sloppy mistakes like that happen

I've edited the question to clarify that I would mention which edition I'm referring to in the references section - the question is mostly about which year should appear in the in-text citations.

@Nathaniel: online I found various resources pointing at a similar solution -- reference to an edition number but no original date of publication as in here

If you are not actually looking at the edition published in 1974, the date 1974 should not appear in the body of the paper.  Equivalently, if you want the date 1974 to appear in the paper (to establish priority of the cited results, for example), go the the library, pull the 1974 edition off the shelf, and verify with your own eyes that the result is there.

@ElCid I found a few similar resources - but it's ambiguous - it doesn't actually state that the year given should be the publication date of the 2nd edition rather than the first-published date.

It is always best and safest to cite the sources you've actually used.
If there are two (or more editions) of a book, you generally don't have a complete list of changes from one version to the next. The relevant information might not be in the first edition, or might be outdated from the one you've used. So: use the edition you've actually read.
This is also true if you've used an eprint on the arXiv, but you later find out that it is published (or will be published) in a journal: still use the arXiv reference.
This is subtle: the eprint wasn't ever peer reviewed, and thus is a less authoritative source. Your wording should always reflect that. If then the e-print is published in a journal, and you only change the reference it's like saying you don't care about peer review. It occurs all too often, but it's simply bad science, even if the contents of the two is word-for-word the same. If you change the reference, re-write the relevant sections as well.

Personally in the last case I would cite the journal version (after checking that of course what you are referring to is still in there), and cite the arxiv version seperately if it differs substantially. The problem is that citations to arXiv preprints are not always accounted for in citation reports, for example.

The problem is that citations to arXiv preprints are not always accounted for in citation reports, for example. — So what?

@JeffE: unfortunately citation counts seem to be important to some administrators... On a more practical level, in databases such as MathSciNet I sometimes find it convenient to see which papers cite a certain paper, to see what related work has been done.

No, I mean why should you care about other people's citation counts?

Ah ok, well I suppose that this is how I would like others to cite my papers, so this is how I would do it. But whether to cite the arXiv or journal version is of relatively minor importance imho.

@Pieter see edit. I have a hunch this is worth a question of its own :)

I believe that the best option is citing the edition you actually used for two reasons: 1- It's more honest (since you're not citing something that maybe you didn't really read); and 2- In some cases the original text may have been revised in a way that may contradict your text.

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Why does grade inflation seem to be so severe in the USA?
A comment on this question on undergraduate admissions notes that a good college might get 10x more applicants who all have the maximum possible grade point average, than the college can admit.  (The rest of my question is based on the assumption that is is actually true.  If it is not, my question might be based on an incorrect premise.)  Coming from The Netherlands, this sounds strange to me.  We have a standardised test at the end of secondary school, and few people score average grades higher than 8/10 (passing is 6/10), with people scoring 10.0/10 being practically nonexistent (I seem to recall reading about one such student in the newspaper many years ago).  The overall average is 6.4/10 for the school category granting admittance to university.  For universities I don't have hard numbers but I would be surprised if more than 1 in 30 students score 10.0/10 in undergraduate introductory calculus. Most students seem to score mostly around 6–7/10, which I believe would translate to E–D in the American system, but I'm not sure.  Grades 6–10 are passing grades, grades 1–5 are failing grades.  My question is for pre-university tests though, the ones that are used to test if people should be admitted to university.
Why is there so much grade inflation in the USA?  Is there no standardised testing for whatever tests are used to establish the grades used for undergraduate admissions?  This system would make it very hard for Dutch students to gain admission to American universities, because getting the maximum average grade is virtually unheard of.
See also: Do price and value of degrees correlate much?

The SAT/ACT are not quite this inflated in the US, though they are periodically rebased or renormalized to account for shifting testing and score levels over time.

This definitely exists for some graduate schools, but I'm not so sure about undergraduate.

As the author of that comment, that is not at all what I was saying. I was saying that they would get 10x their current enrollment if they admitted everyone that was likely to succeed.

I thought If you have 1,000 applicants who all have a 4.0 GPA and a 1550 on the SAT, but only 100 available spots, you need a way to determine who to select implied those were the highest possible scores, but I might have misunderstood.

@gerrit Ah, that's a different comment.

There are many reasons, among which (in my opinion): 1) a generation of overprotective parents who will step on teacher's toes if their special child fails, 2) compounding 1), the US ability to sue anyone for almost anything (including suing for poor grades), 3) a generation of teachers who went through the above and are more concerned about the proper color of a grading pencil than challenging classes, and 4) as in many places teachers are evaluated for their students' test performance, giving a high grade allows them to focus on what really matters (preparing for tests).

@gnometorule That would make a great answer, in particular if you have sources to show those are true not just in your opinion but in reality.  Maybe there has been research into this.

@gerrit No formal studies I know of, but articles like this one float through my attention stream from time to time.

@gnometorule Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, they are.

Following up on @gnometorule 's comment, there is a plausible but hard-to-prove argument that a lot of the US school system was designed as a meritocracy (originally among white men, certainly expanded, never perfect) but has been captured by a justifiably anxious middle-class. We definitely use "a four-year degree" as a social filter for employability, without much care for the contents, with predictable outcomes.

@cphlewis and gnometorule: perhaps indeed, but wow this is 'scope creep' from the discussion topic posed... (isn't that said to be an academic trait ;-) "The education system's messed up and teaches and incentivizes the wrong things, and come to think of it the society it's attached to is too. Man the lifeboats."

@gerri: the unstated question you seem to be asking is "How do American  undergrad admissions assess the GPA equivalent of foreign applicants from different grading systems/curves, and is that unfair to the foreign students to to US grade inflation?". Obviously, the SATs are directly comparable.

@smci That would be a different question that is closely related.

You seem to be basing your question on guessing what the grade profile looks like in the USA, guessing what the grade profile looks like in the Netherlands and asking why they're so different. That doesn't seem like a good basis for a question: it's as much about your perceptions as it is about actual grades.

Grade inflation in the US isn't quite that bad, well not on a UK scale; where  rampant inflation emerged following the abolition of the standardization of secondary grades in the 80's, similarly with University awards in the 90's. There literally has been a 10x increase in the annual number of First Class honours awards in the UK, and in just 21 years (1993: 7,937, 2014: 79,435)

In US, grading depends on the school. In many schools: A=Excellent, B=Above Average (historically, though now B has become the average), C=Average (Historically), D=Below Average/Poor, and F=Fail/Flunk.  There is no E.  There can be modifiers of + or -, so B- is less than a B which is less than B+.  Often there's no A+/D-/F+/F-.  There may also be other less-common letters, particularly in college, like I=Incomplete, V = unofficial withdrawal.  Numeric barriers can vary by dept/class: A common one is every 10% (so 90-100% is A); another common barrier is 3-4% each step (92-94=A-,95-100=A)

There are a couple standardized tests used for undergraduate admissions that are generally taken near the end of high school. The ACT and the SAT are the most common ones.1 However, they are only part of the admissions package, and a relatively small part at that (varies by school, but my guess is they get a weight of around 25% or less at most schools).
There are many reasons not to base admissions solely on a single standardized test.2 One of the biggest is simply that standardized test scores often test studying and resources as much as they test intelligence and preparation. There's already a huge industry built around SAT-specific test preparation, and it's very difficult to argue that this extremely-targeted studying is doing anything beneficial for most student's academic preparation.
Also, keep in mind that the US is a much larger country than European countries, and there is a high amount of geographical mobility among the upper-/middle-class. Undergraduate enrollment in the US is around 18 million; that's larger than the entire population of The Netherlands. Because there is a huge prestige factor in going to a top school, almost all of the top students from that huge population will apply to the same 5-10 top colleges in the US. Even if the distribution of scores is the same as a European country, the much larger applicant pool means that top schools are inevitably going to be swamped with near-perfect applications.
1: The number of perfect SAT scores is actually quite low (I am less familiar with the ACT). In 2014, there were only 583 perfect scores out of 1.6 million test-takers. Though if you consider only the two more-important sections, there were 1,922 perfect CR+M scores. Even considering scores that are basically perfect (say, 1550+), less than half of 1% of test-takers reach that level. Source. However, that 0.5% translates into Harvard getting probably 5,000 applicants with 1550+ scores, which is already over 3x their regular incoming class.
2: The wikipedia article talks briefly about some of them, but there's a huge literature debating the advantages and disadvantages.

Interesting.  The fraction of perfect SAT scores sounds a lot more reasonable than the fraction of students scoring A for a typical test.

"One of the biggest is simply that standardized test scores often test studying and resources as much as they test intelligence and preparation." I can think of a few ways to make this statement precise, but all of them are false. Test prep courses do very little for SAT scores, for example. What exactly do you mean here?

I would think that the best argument against basing admissions solely on SAT scores would be the fact that neither high-school grades nor SAT scores can account for more than 20-30% of the variance in scholastic achievement in college: http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED502858.pdf They have some predictive ability, but that still leaves most of student outcomes as unpredicted (and perhaps even unpredictable).

@BrianDHall: It’s a pity that the paper to which you linked didn’t also look at high school rank in class: that was the best single predictor at the small liberal arts college where my father taught. This was, of course, quite a few years ago, and I have no idea whether this is still the case.

FYI: Point (1) misses an important fact: students can take these tests more than once.

@potato:  don't let anyone tell you that you can't study for the SAT. The key is in how you study, looking for patterns in your errors and correcting those bad habits.  My PSAT was good enough for National Merit Scholar candidate; I brought the score up significantly on the SAT and nailed that down. The classes may or may not be worth anything (I just worked with books of past tests) but this is a practicable set of skills.

@keshlam The usual fear here is that rich kids are boosting their scores dramatically through expensive tutors and courses that are inaccessible to less wealthy students. (This is what I took the comment that the SAT is a test of "resources" to mean.) This is just false, and I can dig up some studies if you want.

@potato: That we agree upon. The difference is more that affluent kids are often given a better education before getting to these tests, and that the expectations kids come into the system with differ strongly by class and community and culture.  Which tends to add up to a triple whammy against inner-city youth.

@potato I wasn't aware of those results for the SAT. That statement was more about standardized testing in general, which, at least when used in primary and secondary education, can be affected by targeted teaching/studying (as far as I am aware).

@RogerFan You'd be surprised. The tests are designed to be fairly resistant to that kind of thing.

@Potato I think references are in order, given the disagreement in opinions so far.

@Heisenberg Here's one: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB124278685697537839

While this is not a proper answer to your question, it applies to the part regarding what happens when you want to compare grades between countries. Consider it an extended comment.
Non-standarization of grades is a huge source of unfairness, in particular in Europe where the common job market it atomized into many sub-systems (countries), each with their own long standing tradition of grading. I have first hand experience with the university grading systems in Spain, Italy and Ireland (so this does not apply to undergrad bachelors admissions, but perhaps masters and doctoral). I now work in a Finnish university but I am not familiar with how the grading is done.
In Spain the grading is 0-10, with 5 being a pass. Anyone scoring above 8 average would be rare. However a passing grade then translates non linearly to a 1-4 scale, where the number of 4s is actually limited per year and subject to the willingness of the teacher to give. What is more, every time you fail an exam this lowers your average, so if you fail once then get say a 6.5/10 on the next exam this will get you a 0.5/4 on the final grade.
In Italy the grading is 0-30 with 18 being a pass. However I observed in my one year in an Italian university that one can actually negotiate their grade with the teacher and if they're not happy simply repeat until they get a grade they're happy with. Any decent student will thus finish with averages above 26/30 and even higher averages in the 28s or 29s are not that uncommon.
In Ireland it matters whether you get "first class honors" or not, which I think in practice means getting above 7.5/10 average or so. First class honors will e.g. grant you access to a PhD program skipping the masters. Failing students is a bit regarded as "not nice" in Ireland, and as a matter of fact any good student putting some effort will finish with a first class degree.
The three systems above work in their respective countries because people understand how the grading is done and how that reflects on the student's abilities. Whether any of them is inflated is irrelevant within the country because the same bias applies to every student. The issue is when we try to compare students who come from different systems, in particular in the context of the unified European market. I myself had quite a bit of trouble with my admission to an Irish university for a PhD, since my grades were in the Spanish non-linear system. This meant that even if I was a strong student I was put on "probation" for a year so I could prove that I could get a PhD despite what my "poor" grades indicated.
I think a) standarization of grades or b) official homologation of grades taking into account the countries traditions and renormalization are in great need in Europe.

Note that this isn't so much of an issue when comparing international students to US students (which is what the OP seems to be suggesting). I think the limiting factor there tends to be international quotas on admissions and competition from the large amounts of highly qualified asian students.

I think you're comparing apples and oranges.  Grade point average (GPA) is a reflection of a student's average academic performance across all their classes.  It is not based on a single standardized test, and "maximum GPA" does not imply perfect test results.
Setting that aside, though, you're also running into a difference in grading philosophy. This article compares the grading systems in the US, UK, and Netherlands.  Quoting from there:

When the 1 through to 10 scale was officially introduced [in the Nethherlands] back to the late 19th
  century, it was decided that a 10 should only be awarded in cases of absolute perfection. Furthermore, as at the time it was felt to be almost blasphemous for mere mortals to be judging what constituted absolute perfection, a 10 was hardly ever awarded. A 9 was considered to be only a slightly less impossible goal to reach.

In contrast, getting a top mark of "A" in a US class only requires you to answer 90% of the exam questions correctly, and often accounts for things like attendance, class participation, and more.  This is eminently achievable.
Grades in the US are often normalized, with the top 10% of students being awarded an "A" grade(1).   In contrast, a 10/10 in the Netherlands represents the top 0.1% of students.
Based on the conversion tables in that article, I'd say a "maximum GPA" in the US would be roughly equivalent to an "8" in the Netherlands.
So I wouldn't say that the grades are inflated in the US, per se, just that they're defined differently.
(1) There is some evidence of true grade inflation in the US in recent years, but I don't think that's relevant to the disparity between the US and the Netherlands systems.

I am not sure grade inflation has much to do with the top students as much as the improvement in grades seen in average and below average students.

@StrongBad - That may be, but either way I don't think it changes the fundamental difference in grading philosophy or the 10% / 0.1% criteria for achieving grades.

I think you are correct. With my MSc degree (which I obtained in the Netherlands), I received a seperate paper converting the Dutch style grades to US style grades, and 8/10 was comparable to an A if I remember correctly (could have been A+). I think this paper was supplied by the Dutch organisation for education internationalization Nuffic.

You have just defined away the participle inflated. That isn't an answer.

An obvious reason for the exceptional degree of grade inflation in US high schools is that the public school system is extremely decentralized. Different local school systems are each funded not so much according to the number of students they have (as I imagine would be the case in a civilized  country like the Netherlands) but according to the property values in their local community. This means that in any given area, neighboring school districts are in competition with each other. When there is a perception that a community has "good schools", more families will move there. This perception will in turn help to elevate property values, and therefore to increase the revenue base available to fund the schools.
Here is an interesting illustration from Farifax County in the state of Virginia, as reported in Time magazine.

Residents of the high-powered Washington suburb have been battling the school district's tough grading practices; chief among their complaints is that a score of 93% gets recorded as a lowly B+. After forming an official protest group called Fairgrade last year and goading the school board into voting on whether to ease the standards, parents marshaled 10,000 signatures online and on Jan. 22 gathered nearly 500 supporters to help plead their case. After two hours of debate, the school board passed a resolution, a move critics consider a defeat in the war on grade inflation.

[...]

The vote is good news for local business leaders who have joined the Fairgrade effort, warning that families worried about their kids getting into good colleges may move out of the county if the school district doesn't change its grading system. Talk of a possible exodus killing off businesses and destroying property values sounds a tad melodramatic, but given the tanking market and ongoing credit crunch, it's no wonder people are trying to do everything they can to shore up the local economy.

So there you have it. The article points out that this is getting worse as the trend in university admissions is to emphasize grades more and standardized tests less. It says that "75 districts in 12 states have relaxed their grading standards since 2005." This wouldn't even be an option in most countries and if it were there would not be the same economic incentives to do it.

While your point about de-centralization is a good one, I don't think the Fairfax example quite fits.  90-93% is defined as an A- in the standard College Board system and many (if not most) high schools in the US.  Parents protesting that their school district get on board with the standard hardly seems like an example of "grade inflation".

Fair enough. I'm not sure if you are questioning that grade inflation as a general pattern actually exists in the first place, but if so, there is plenty of data on that part.

No, not questioning the trend, just that particular example struck me odd.

While not directly an answer to either the titular question, or even the statement that there are 10 applicants with perfect GPAs and SATs for every spot, I think the answer is that you do not need a perfect GPA and SAT to get into a top school. For example Harvard publishes self reported GRE and SAT scores of incoming students. While some have perfect, or near perfect, scores on both, there are tails, not very long, but tails none the less. There seems to be many more students with 4.0 GPAs than perfect scores on the SAT.
While GPA inflation likely exists, a 4.0 GPA is only a 93% average so is not a perfect score. This means you can in fact get a 4.0 GPA with B's (or even lower) in a handful of classes if you offset them by getting g A+'s in other classes. You can also get a 4.0 without ever getting a top grade of A+.
The SATs may also be inflated, but they are standardized. The mean score in each of the three categories is around 500/800 with a minimum scores of 200. Less than 1% get over a 780, and only about 5% get over a 700 in any one category. Presumably less than 5% have a composite score less than 2100/2400.

Here is one source confirming your statement that inflation "likely exists."

@gnometorule I am puzzled that a country where public education appears to be so poor, still "produces" a reasonably large number of apparently successful people.  But we're getting off-topic when discussing the state of secondary education in the USA.

@gerrit: At the top, the US still has excellent pre-college schools. There are private prep schools, and public so-called magnet schools, say. Grade inflation doesn't mean that the top students are less good, or don't get the opportunity to be well-prepared for college. It just makes GPA much less meaningful, a bit like a participation medal. There are attempts to in-elite elite schools (see another comment above), but you have the same in France, say, with their Ecole system.

@gnometorule I was referring not only to grade inflation, but also to the narrative you linked in the comment...

@gnometorule ideally we need to know about grade inflation for top students and not all students

actually you know what public schools get a bad rap a lot, but there are a lot of non so called magnet schools, and non private prep schools that do an excellent job preparing their students for college. I went to one such school that routinely beat out all of the private schools and so called magnet schools in my state. It was ranked number one in my state.

"you can in fact get a 4.0 GPA with a handful of Bs" wait, what? I got a single B in four years and it pulled my GPA down to 3.98...

@Michael - I think maybe what he meant was that in a given class you can get some B's on exams and still walk away with an "A" in that class, maintaining a 4.0 overall.  There are also some school systems that award more than 4.0 points for honors classes, making it possible to compensate for a "B" in a non-honors class.

@michael, an A+ is usually counted as a 98 and a B+ is an 88. So if you got A+'s in half your classes and B+'s in the other half you would still have a 93 average and a 4.0 GPA.

@Lynn that is not what I meant at all. See edit. The existence of an A+ screws everything up. Top students do not aim for straight A's, they aim for straight A+'s.

It all depends on how the school is graded. At my school, A-'s, A's and A+'s all counted as 4.0 in your GPA, so to maintain a 4.0 you couldn't get any B+'s. Other schools I know calculated them differently. Many schools often have a "weighted GPA," which awards extra points for honors/AP/IB classes. But those systems tend to penalize taking electives.

I don't think you can conclude, at least based solely on the observation that universities are seeing more applicants with high GPAs than they can admit, that the problem is grade inflation.  Another possibility is that the effect is due to students applying to so many colleges.  According to this survey, the number of students applying to at least 7 colleges has tripled since 1990.  There are a number of potential causes for this, but that discussion is probably out of scope for the discussion.

By "grade inflation," I think you are really asking why are the grading scales so different.  I don't have much supporting evidence for this, but I suspect a large part of it is due to the American individualistic and consumer culture, with a penchant for heaping praise and awards on students (see also this question, and the first link in Lynn's answer) and being effusive in recommendation letters.  The consumer culture part is related to economic incentives mentioned in Brian Z's answer.
Another factor to consider, which I don't think has been mentioned before, is that the student population is extremely heterogeneous.  I suspect there was a historical trend of higher grade averages in US than Europe even when the US population was not as varied as it is now, but I think the diversity in population (e.g., many students who don't speak English as a first language, or have supportive homes) pushes schools and teachers to be more "forgiving" with grades to give the kids with disadvantages more encouragement and a better chance to catch up.  (This is not to suggest US academics is even close to being equal opportunity, sadly.)

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


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How does job security in academic untenured soft money positions compare with job security in industry?
With tenured hard-money positions being increasingly competitive, some researchers spend their entire career on soft money untenured positions.  To me, it would seem quite bad to never know more than one or two years in advance whether one will still have a job (see also this question).  But a senior soft money colleague (who has been on soft money since starting a post-doc 25+ years ago) pointed out it's really no worse than working for a private company, where you also never know the same.  That made me wonder.
In practice, how does the job security of soft money career scientists compare to scientists working for private companies?  Is there any data which one is at a higher risk of being laid off from a position that has been held for a long (10+ years) time¹?  And if people are then laid off, how quickly they find a similar position, if at all?
For the sake of this question, consider STEM companies that are relatively close to research, such as consultancy companies developing scientific products (such as software) or performing scientific services (such as running simulations) in close cooperation with university and/or government research labs.

¹There may be a special case where researchers work for different government contractors during their career, but for the same client and even in physically the same office.  Despite the problems that entails, here I mean laid off without being almost immediately rehired to do the same job as before.

I work at a company with a lot of similarity to soft-money academia: research is PI-driven and mostly funded by external contracts and grants.  In the US, there are actually a lot of companies that either wholly or in part operate this way.
In this type of research organization, in some ways there is more security than an academic organization and in other ways less.  Here are the key points as I see it:

More individual job security: In most academic soft-money posts, you are tied primarily to your grants or the grants of the PI that you work for.  There is very little organizational commitment to you as an investigator.  Thus, if your money dries up, there is little or no bridge funding to keep you going as you try to get more money; you just stop getting paid.  In a permanent corporate post, there is a fallback to being assigned as a performer on other people's projects, even perhaps in other departments, and the company is motivated to find such connections because you are still being paid.
Less institutional job security: On the flip side, universities are extremely durable as organizations, and tend to change much more slowly and less dramatically than companies.  A company might be suddenly acquired or change leadership and suddenly all of its policies change radically.  So despite having a position, you might find yourself not wanting it under a new regime---or research itself might be jettisoned, and you along with it.

The lack of institutional job security, however, is actually less bad than it appears, for anybody with either a healthy research program or who is well-known as a talented contributor.  In practice, what bad institutional change tends to mean is that you end up with a diaspora, in which good people move en masse, either joining other nearby companies with better research cultures or founding their own.  This might happen even if the new "parent company" doesn't have an office in the area---I know of more than one regional branch office that was opened because a group of researchers left Company A and their colleagues at Company B invited them to join, figuring that geography could be worked out one way or another.
In short: from what I see, externally funded research at companies is significantly more stable than soft-money academia, despite the fact that company identity may change over time in various ways.

Re penultimate paragraph: Example: the fall of AT&T/Bell Labs.  They had many great people, who left and got tenured jobs as great places like Caltech and Michigan (and I'm sure many found other great positions in industry too).

In Europe a great example of the lessened institutional job security is what happened to the staff at what was formerly SAP Research. From what I understand, they pretty much from one day to another stopped being "SAP Research" and started being part of SAP Software Development, and were suddenly expected to deliver products rather than research results.

In addition to these other good answers, you'll also find that many public institutions have rules that require long notification periods for people who may be laid off if their funding runs out. This does not happen at my university, but others that I know at several different US universities must receive a notification one year in advance of a layoff due to lack of funding for their position.
This means that there's plenty of time for them to try to write and win grant proposals or to find another job in the ways described here by others. It also means that there's no sudden drop at the end where people are surprised to not have a job. This is usually not the case in industry research positions.

I can only partly answer your question, because I don't have sector-wide data.
First, let's clarify terms. Someone in a soft-money research post is also called a research associate, and they are funded by defined pots of money (typically from research contracts) that will be exhausted: such posts are usually funded for a period of time that's set from the beginning. These sound similar to posts that are also called post-docs, although a research associate doesn't need a doctorate: they just need to demonstrate that they can do deep, novel, rigorous research. This is in contrast to tenured faculty who are funded by open-ended sources such as university core funding (though I gather at some universities there are some professors on 95% soft money: at UCL, such posts are called "Professorial Research Associate", rather than "Professor"; both carry the honorific title Professor").
In England, I see job security as depending very much on a department's culture and management philosophy. I know of people in soft-money posts in energy departments at some other universities who have much less job security than most industry jobs that are similar. Whereas at in the energy department at my university, with mostly the same sources of funding and very similar projects, most soft-money posts here have more job security than similar industry: there is a departmental commitment to the researchers themselves, and if one source of funding dries up, we try to find other funded projects for those researchers, and use a platform grant to fill any gaps.
It's also the case that in industry you'll find some employers who will choose to keep some of their funds available in highly liquid form (such as cash at bank), in order to allow them to retain staff even at times when the company's turnover doesn't merit it; other employers will have staff coming and going all the time, as the company's income waxes and wanes.

At U.S. medical schools, professors are often paid up to 95% off of soft money that they have to raise themselves. To the outside world it may look no different from a professor who has 9 or 12 months of their salary paid by the institution. It's also separate from tenure. There are universities that will give you tenure but not guarantee your full salary.

@MichaelHoffman interesting: at UCL, those posts are titled "professorial research associate": one still gets the honorific title "professor", but the job title is not "professor".

There are many good answers here, but let me point out some other factors. (Off course, details are depend on on which county, profession, sector etc. we talk about):

Industrial jobs are generally (much) better paid than academic jobs and the hiring process is also much faster. This means that even if you have same chance for getting laid off, you generally fall much safely in industry, with significantly bigger pillows under you. To get soft money through grants to get yourself hired may require a year or longer, even if your first shots are successful. Getting a job in industry can happen in weeks.
Job prospects and overspecialization. Again, there can be huge variations but being a forever post-doc, even with a good salary is seriously limiting your future job prospects. I know many academics who consider such people failed researchers, and consider such a career a stigma, and can look very bad on your CV. It is also hard to switch  to tenured academic positions, when you are 40-50. With industrial jobs there is no such stigma, and an industrial researcher has much more options to switch to academia, find job in industry or go to management. This setback may change as soft money positions became more common, though.
Do we compare apples with oranges? Significant part of post doctoral researchers are stuck in this position for years, then some of them leave to industry, so go to tenure track and some remains on soft money. My experience is that people who are willing and able to survive on soft money for long are people who have a special combination of skills (they must be good to survive) and motivation to stay in academic research. Also, they often have a specific motivation to not go to industry (want to be independent) or to go tenure track. On the other hand, in industry there are a lot of different kind of people, in terms of motivation, skill-set, interest etc. I think there is a strong selection bias if you directly want to compare these to groups of people and their job security.

Really more of a comment than an answer - but this might invite some general discussion with regards to the two major points this hinges on:
(Hence the community wiki)

I suspect there is a huge "it depends" with this - mainly due to personal preferences. Some people prefer to move, so having 2-3 years of security only is not bad to them in their eyes.
If in contrast you seek security, a public sector job with something called "Beamtenstatus" is ideal (you can't be discharged without any serious cause), but even then companies such as BASF or other large companies offer permanent positions, which is possibly as close as one can get to security/safety.
Once you have sorted out the personal choice between "wants change" vs. "wants security", the next question is, "are you good at getting money".
IF you have a lot of industry contacts and are extremely successful at obtaining research grants, not having a permanent position isn't a problem - a university would not like to see you go because of your contacts and the money you bring in, so you have arranged your own job security without a tenured position.
One potential advantage of such an arrangement is that you do not teach and at most supervise some PhD students, so aside from the (nowadays horrendous) paperwork, you actually get to do research.
Also, at least in one UK university, after 6 years, if there were no grant money, the university would have to find money to employ you otherwise - however this may be specific to that university.


text:
How bad is it to decline the NSF graduate fellowship?
Though NSF results aren't out yet for this year, this question's been wracking my brain since I'm heavily considering taking a gap year before grad school. I also haven't been able to find this particular question asked/answered anywhere online and I feel like there are surely others that might find themselves in this same situation, so I'm asking here.
Basically, I completed my NSF application in the fall with confidence, and then around a month later found out that my subject GRE scores were abysmal. Coupled with a fairly "low" GPA, I ended up not getting into any grad schools except my least-ranked backup school and a waitlist to another backup. I've talked over with my advisor and we agreed that taking a year off to reapply would be good for me. For one, I can retake the exam and possibly get into a wider range of schools, which means more opportunities to choose from. A second consideration is that part of the reason I didn't do well in school, which I only realized recently, is that I had been ignoring my mental health for years (I didn't believe "mental health" was a real thing, oops) and taking a gap year would help me put a year's worth of space between being thrown into grad classes while I heal. I've also already got plans for the year in place--I would be doing full-time research work for both my advisor and as part of a program I was accepted to. I feel like this is the healthiest, best route for me and is the one I'm most comfortable with.
However, there's still a chance I could win the NSF (which is exceedingly rare and a crapshoot for anyone, I know, but anyone who doesn't withdraw is technically still in the running!), which means I would have to go to grad school next year to accept the award. They removed the option to defer years ago unless you're active in the military or have a medical issue (I assume this means hospitalization, not going through something like CBT). Because it's such a competitive fellowship, I always had the notion that it would be just plain "stupid" to turn it down (unless, of course, you got some sort of better award). However, because of the reasons I stated in the paragraph above, I'm definitely less comfortable with this path.
In this scenario, which should take priority? Accepting a competitive fellowship at a backup school I'm unsure about, or taking a year off to reapply and have more options (especially at top choice, selective institutions), albeit without the NSF or possibly any sort of external fellowship? Has anyone gone through either route and regretted it? Also, how does listing a declined award (NOT in the context of winning other awards and having to choose only one) look on a CV? For context, I'm interested in attempting a career as tenured faculty in academia (which is also exceedingly unlikely, I know).

To be brutally honest: if you weren't competitive for gradschool applications, maybe you weren't for NSF either, so don't worry about it too much. And if you actually do get it, and do go to your backup school, maybe you can transfer out after a year if the fit's not right.

The question is extremely hypothetical and no answer would likely be of general interest.

@jayjay67, I also don't know what youre talking about regarding reserve. As far as I know, reserve is still allowed.

There are no consequences to you if you decline the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.  You did waste the reviewers' time.
If you get the fellowship and do not get into your first choice PhD program, then I suggest contacting your first choice and asking them if they will reconsider.  Many places are happy to have a PhD student they are paid by NSF to take, when the usual situation is they have to pay to get a PhD student.


text:
Is there a "place" to deposit and, or publish reports produced in grad school?
I am looking for some kind of repository where I can "publish" my reports from grad school.
I'd like to do this because it would be great if I could link those works with my ORCID and make them available to the public and to (hopefully) improve my online appearance.

More importantly, what field are you in?

I am studying biology and therefore occasionly write reports summarizing literature about a specific topic. Recently I have written some works with data that I have produced myself, concerning plant genetics.

Is the question Is it advisable to upload your PhD thesis on Biorxiv? helpful to you?

I have considered the option of sending the reports to Biorxiv, or ArXiv. But it seems to me, that my reports do not fit their conditions, as they're not likely to be published in real journals later on.
What I am trying to get at is, if there's is a repository for such work that enables one to google them.

If you upload them to your own website, Google Scholar will find them. (https://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/inclusion.html)

For arXiv, it's not a requirement that the paper is "likely" to be published in a real journal.  The standard is "refereeable", i.e. is this the kind of paper that a journal might conceivably publish, if it were submitted?  Lots of people submit things to arXiv that they have no intention of ever sending to a journal, and that's fine.

It makes sense to share your work online as long as you make sure to do some quality check. Students can benefit from availability of this type of material and it can indeed improve the online presence of the author.
Quality check

Check for English correction as best as you can. I would strongly suggest languagetool.org as an excellent tool for this.
Do not copy direct parts from other authors, make sure not to plagiarize. This is something that takes time and is often overlooked. Clearly point out where you are quoting and where words are your own. Always give author's name, date and page where the information was obtained. Here is an excellent source in the subject: Melbourne University Student Skill manual
Conform to one citation standard and check correctness of the citations (provide a doi whenever possible).
Use an open science tool, so to permit transparency of the contents. This is particularly important if your report includes statistics. Have a look in the Knitr R package or my own Mighty_Make.

You can list any material you want in your ORCID page. However, do that clarifying which material was peer-reviewed, and which was not. Graduation level reviews goes in the group of non-peer-reviewed scientific contributions.
Where to publish?
This is the easy part, a very effective tool is zenodo.org. Once you feel your document is ready for submission, you can upload it there, and you will have a doi for your material so it can be cited and tracked.


text:
F1 Visa Internship Question
Can I do an internship during my first semester of college in a state other than the one where my university is located?

Best ask the university...

Please check this with the international students office of your university. For what I understand, F-1 holder can have on-campus part time job during the semester.

My understanding is that you generally cannot. F-1 visas holders are allowed to hold part-time (up to 20 hours/week) on-campus jobs during all semesters enrolled (though I'm told that some positions don't count as on-campus, despite physically taking place on-campus). Authorization for off-campus work can only be granted after the first academic year.
As scaaahu suggests, you should ask the international office at your university about your specific situation. They should be able to advise you also about potential exceptions to what I wrote above, e.g. unpaid internships.

You can apply for CPT (Curricular Practical Training) after completing your first year, sponsored by your school/department. You will need to receive credit for it. This is different from OPT (Optional Practical Training) where you can apply within the first year after your graduation.

Can you really apply for CPT during the first year of studies though? See the link in my answer, which seems to say no. Also, there is both pre- and post-completion OPT, so you don't necessarily need to wait to graduation for OPT.

you're correct that you're not eligible for the first year. I will revise my answer. Thanks for catching that.


text:
Should one update a manuscript to current state-of-art when re-submitting?
Publishing in a journal is a long process that might take a lot of time (> 1 year), and is possibly involved of several phases (submit, re-submit, re-re-submit...)
As the time passes, things change. Specifically, new results appear.
What should one do with the new stuff that happens between resubmissions?

Do one needs to cite / refer to papers that first appeared after the original date submission?
Do one needs to update citations to papers that on the date of the original submission appeared only on arXiv, but now appear in a journal (those possibly slightly different than the original work cited in the original submission)?

EDIT:
 maybe one should wait for acceptance, and only then do the updates?

It's worth checking out this answer to a slightly different question regarding preprints but I think the the manuscript should be updated as much as possible. http://academia.stackexchange.com/a/1149/319

@ran-g Since you have some responses below that seem to answer your question, please consider marking one of them as ‘Accepted’.

Yes, you should update your references at every possible opportunity.  Whenever the manuscript is in your hands, if it is possible for you to update the references, you should do so.  Paper rejected?  Update the references before resubmission.  Paper accepted?  Update the references before sending back the revision.  Multiple rounds of reviewing?  Update the references after each round.  Submitting a journal version of a conference paper?  Update the references before submission.  Reviewing galley proofs?  Okay, then you probably can't update the references.
Your paper serves as not only a description of your new result but also as a guide to the surrounding literature.  Your readers (including referees and editors) are best served by the most up-to-date snapshot possible.
Of course, if one of the papers you cite has undergone a revision (for example, and ArXiv preprint has appeared in a journal), you must read the new revision yourself to make sure that the cited information is still there, so that you know how to appropriately cite it.
I typically tag completely new references (for example, a relevant ArXiv preprint appears while my paper is under review) with phrases like "Since this paper was submitted..." or (since I'm in computer science) "Since the preliminary version of this paper appeared...."

Would like to add a partial answer. Don't know the answer to the first one.
But about the second:

Do one needs to update citations to papers .....?

Yes, they need to be updated. Most publishers ask to update bibliography with latest information.
But if the original content that appeared in arXiv is changed in the final publication, it is better to keep the original citation in your paper, specifying the exact version that you cited.

The answer to both of these questions is it's your choice.  However, I definitely recommend that you update the citation information, because (a) it probably won't take long and (b) it will possibly be quite helpful to your readers.
I work in a field where it's uncommon for much to change between the time that I first submit and that I resubmit.  Perhaps I might find out that someone proved a result in our paper about the same time that we did.  In that case, I would add a line in the acknowledgments section stating so, and add a citation to the relevant paper or preprint.

Might some of the reviewers have published the relevant paper(s) that have come out and which you are not citing?  Yes?  Might they appreciate it if you cite rather than ignore their work?  Yes?  Better update your citations, then.


text:
Referencing a board game rule book
I'm writing a paper on a board game,
Labyrinth, and I need to use some parts of the rule book. How should I reference this? I'm using Harvard reference style.
EDIT: I hadn't notice this earlier.
What can be found in the start of the rule book is this:

Author: Max J. Kobbert

And in the end, this:

© 2007 Ravensburger Spieleverlag

EDIT 2: I found a link to the rule book. The real one contains for several more languages but the content is the same.
Link to rule book

Welcome to Academia.SE! As a first guess, look up the copyright information in the rule book and cite it as a book. If none is available, find the relevant information (e.g. for a corporate author) from other sources

I have updated the question with some new found information

The point of referencing is to allow others to determine what you've referenced and to look it up in turn.
Harvard has tools for citing multi-media formats, such as board games.
Inline: ([Rulebook] 1986).
Biblio: [Rulebook] 1986 Labyrinth (boardgame), Ravensburger.
Consult a full style guide and model off the nearest multi media work, for example, album liners to a CD.
Are you sure 2007 is really the date of the edition and not the printing?
(Kobbert 2007).
Kobbert, MJ 2007 '[Rulebook]' Labyrinth (boardgame), Ravensburger Spieleverlag.

Updated the question once again to provide all the information I have. I think why it is 2007 is because it's a new edition of the game. You can see there is different edition with different player tokens and slightly different pictures on the tiles, if you Google for some images.

If this is all you've got, then okay, but I strongly advise you to examine the physical object fully for edition information, so you can supply edition information with your citation.

I can't find anymore information except repeating information of what I already know, on the back.


text:
What was offensive about the "ladies lingerie department" joke, and how can I avoid offending people in a similar way?
Moderator note: A follow-on question about how to avoid the behavior described here has been posted.

In recent news, two academics are at odds over this incident full article here:

The fuss started when [Prof. X] and [Prof. Y] ended up in the same crowded elevator during a conference at a Hilton in San Francisco last month.  [Prof. Y] said she offered to press the floor buttons for people in the elevator, whom she described as mostly conference attendees and all, except one other woman, white middle-aged men. Instead of saying a floor, [Prof. X] smiled and asked for the women’s lingerie department "and all his buddies laughed," [Prof. Y] wrote in a complaint, the details of which he disputed, to the association later that day.

This incident has escalated to the point that the academic organization that organized the conference has decided to sanction Prof. X.
I don't understand why the joke was funny, but that's not really important.  I would like to understand why it was offensive.  Specifically, I'm wondering

In what way was this comment offensive?

The bullets above are not rhetorical or sarcastic; I am completely sincere.  I am worried because I don't understand precisely what was offensive, so I fear that I might do something similar.  I have wondered whether the remark was offensive because:

It referred to underwear
It referred to women (in any way) and was cause for laughter
There is some unstated assumption about his reason for supposedly going to a lingerie department

But I really have no idea, and I want to understand.  I could not find an answer in any of the news pieces on this incident.
I realize that this question might get closed as off-topic.  However, I think it is wrong to assume that no part of this is specific to academic culture (if that's the case, that's part of the answer).  Certainly it occurred in a uniquely academic environment, and is a dispute between academics and an academic society, that seems to jeopardize at least one academic career.
Please refrain from using this as a place to express your opinion on who is right in this dispute.  That's not what I'm asking.

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. If you want to explain the joke, either elaborate in an answer (but please ensure that your answer actually adds something to the existing ones) or do so in chat. Please use comments only for their intended purpose.

Meta discussion about this question.

tl;dr: The joke was funny because it was absurd and taboo (made people uncomfortable). It was "offensive" because it may have been intended to make the person operating the elevator feel embarrassed or singled-out. Avoid making jokes that make people feel singled-out.
How is the joke funny?
As other answers have pointed out, the joke is funny because it makes reference to a time when elevator operators were the norm and people would call out the desired floor in a department store by asking for a specific department. It is an absurd (out-of-place) comment to make in the context (the present day, and not in a department store). Often, absurdity is funny.
There is, however, another layer to the humour. People will often laugh when in an uncomfortable situation. The joke is uncomfortable because of the floor that was asked for: ladies lingerie. In some cultures (I can say Canada and the UK for sure) the topic of undergarments, especially ladies undergarments, is taboo and therefore not supposed to be discussed in "polite society".
In what way was the comment offensive?
I think other answers are close, but slightly miss the mark. The reason I think the joke is offensive is because, whether it was intended or not, it made the person operating the elevator uncomfortable or embarrassed. On a more subtle note the reason is context.
The person operating the elevator may have felt like they were targeted by the joke. They asked an innocent question "What floor?" and the joker replies with the less-than-innocent answer "Ladies lingerie". We can only speculate as to the intentions of the joker, but it is clear that while the joke may have been directed to everyone in the elevator, the answer was directed to the person operating the elevator. Add the fact that the person operating the elevator was a woman, and it doesn't seem so far-fetched to think that she may have felt targeted by the joke.
To further consider this point: why was the department "ladies lingerie" chosen? The joker could have asked for "the hardware department" or "men's clothing" or "sporting goods" and the joke would have drawn a few chuckles. "Ladies lingerie" was chosen because it is taboo, and it is extra taboo because it is a man directing the comment at a woman. More discomfort = more likely to provoke laughs (even though the people in the elevator might feel more uncomfortable than tickled).
Finally, consider the context: a male dominated space. I can say from personal experience (as a man) that it is not uncommon for a group of men to direct lewd or taboo comments at women (or sometimes a young/innocent-seeming man) to provoke embarrassment. Heck, I'm guilty of doing it myself, before I realized how it makes the target of the joke feel! It is likely that the person operating the elevator experienced this sort of behaviour many times before and assumed (perhaps rightly) that the joke was targeted at her and was intended to make her feel embarrassed.
Making someone feel embarrassed for your personal entertainment = bullying. Bullying should not be tolerated, especially in a professional setting.
If it was an elevator full of women and a woman made the joke, the context would be different and the person operating the elevator may not have felt singled-out. Similarly if it was entirely men. However, even in these contexts it is possible for the joke to be construed as bullying, especially if the target of the joke is someone that the joker knows would feel embarrassed.
How do I avoid offending people in a similar way?
Avoid jokes involving topics that make people uncomfortable, especially when telling jokes to strangers or acquaintances. Generally avoid taboo topics of whatever culture you are in and especially avoid jokes that might make someone feel targeted or singled-out based on race, skin colour, sexuality, gender, etc.

I think this is a good answer because it addresses something that others have missed. Even if the target of the joke "gets it", they may still be made to feel uncomfortable by it. A joke can be inappropriate even if you understand why it is supposed to be funny.

So the answer obviously is to stop joking about anything at all, ever, except perhaps when you're by yourself. Don't joke. If you joke, you deserve what you've got coming.

@L0j1k I'm sorry that you interpreted my answer this way. In fact, I never commented on what the joker may or may not "deserve" for making someone else uncomfortable. I also never said joking is wrong. In fact, I offered examples of other jokes in a similar vein that wouldn't embarrass someone else, while sacrificing (I suppose) the "punchiness" of the joke. It's a matter of simple professional politeness, and perhaps a bit of empathy, to determine what sorts of jokes may be acceptable in a given situation. We're not talking about a comedy club, we're talking about an elevator at a conference.

I wouldn't say that it's bullying, specifically. That seems to require intent and repetition? ... Googles Or maybe not. ... Your answer is a lot better than mine, congrats! Although, I find it overly verbose, but like the detail... Well, those are mutually exclusive.

From the article, "He said it was a man, not a woman, who asked for the floors and that the other men in the elevator were not his "buddies" as she had described them.". If it were a men asking for the floors, would the joke still be considered offensive?

@Childishforlife As I stated in the answer, it's context dependent. There are many variables to choose from and therefore a near infinite number of potential contexts. So it might still make a woman in the elevator feel uncomfortable and singled-out when a joke is made regarding women's underwear, regardless of whether or not she was the one who asked for the floor. I can't say for every context whether or not the joke was ill-advised. I'm also not the best judge of what would or wouldn't make a woman uncomfortable since I am not a woman. But I can use my empathy to the best of my abilities.

@Childishforlife Consider another (hypothetical) context: maybe the woman and man in question know each other and have already established a relationship where these sorts of jokes are common and accepted between them. So there are some contexts where the joke is perfectly fine. (Of course, then you might run the risk of someone being offended on someone else's behalf, which I have mixed feelings about.)

@CuriousFindings Your answer is indeed insightful.
However, I've learned when I was young to have a thicker skin about things that make me uncomfortable (as an ethnic person, I've had to deal with racial slurs, and thus a similar line of reasoning could apply as here, at least w.r.t. being offended).
If everyone had a slightly thicker skin, and not immediately assume bad faith, the world of interactions between strangers would be a much more welcoming one.
Another issue is self-victimisation i.e. turning yourself into the victim. It's almost always a bad idea to do so in my experience.

@jjpe I agree with you that getting a thicker skin is a good thing. There are people in this world who are just plain mean, and they might even try to hurt you just for fun. Others just make honest mistakes. It's good to be able to shrug off their comments no matter their intentions. That being said, my answer comes from the context of the OP asking "How was this comment wrong? How can I avoid a similar mistake?" So for those people who don't want to be seen as offensive, I say avoid taboo topics. A professional setting is not the place to be pushing the boundaries of taste.

A great way to not make anyone uncomfortable is to resign and go leave in the woods. :)

@Najib Idrissi gave a very good answer, but I think there is one more key element to this situation, and that is the typical dimensions of a lift.
Lifts are small, people have to stand close together. This makes some people a little nervous about the possibility that someone else might take it as an opportunity to invade their personal space or touch them inappropriately. In a lift, such an act could be passed off as unintentional, because people were standing close already. Just like the problems with people getting groped on packed trains.
So in this situation, it is only kind to behave in as reassuring a manner as possible. This will reduce the fear people feel because of how close they have to stand.
As such, even if this joke had not been specifically about women’s sexuality, and just about sexuality in general, it was the wrong moment to tell it.
To tell a sex related joke is always a bit of a gamble, but if the person you are talking to is comfortable around you, it might be fine. The trick is to know if they are comfortable at that moment. In a crowded lift they are more likely to be a little uncomfortable. In a male dominated environment this is more likely to be a problem for women, but it could apply to anyone.
The long and short of it is don't tell sex jokes unless you are confident that they are not misogynistic (in context this one was), and confident that that the other person is comfortable around you.

+1, this is the right answer! The solution is just to not tell crass jokes. It really doesn't matter the intent (which in this case was perfectly benign), the point is that communication is difficult and language is a lossy medium. It's just common sense.

@knzhou You cannot know what the intent was at the time...

@mb21 true, knowing is a joke is going to come across badly is very difficult. Ratner's is a powerful example of this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Ratner#The_speech So really it's helpful for people to have some "rule of thumb" to aid their judgement

@knzhou while I would agree that this particular joke is always crass, I hope my answer covers some jokes that might be ok in other contexts, but not in a lift.

@knzhou I have to disagree with you there. In the relative privacy of my office I have a good handle on what jokes my office mates will find funny and what would be going too far. But I know these people, I know they are comfortable with me and I know their sense of humour and that makes all the difference.

If mentioning underwear even under the name lingerie is tantamount to sexuality then am I going to be labeled a pedophile if I mention a need for diapers?

@DeanMacGregor can you not tell the deference between the connotations of the word 'diaper' and 'lingerie'? If you said "I'm going to get lingerie for my baby" most people are going to assume that you are referring to your adult partner not an infant, because although they both get called baby the word lingerie implies something completely different to diaper. And if in that sentence you where referring to an infant most people would be a bit surprised, and yes possibly concerned.

I'd even say that the crowed situation in a lift constitues an invasion of private space for many people - I'm not talking about inappropriately touching but about being forced to be uncomfortably close. While "do not make inappropriate jokes" is certainly good and valid advise, I'd also consider the possibility that the uncomfortable packing of people could trigger attempts to relieve the pressure, e.g. by a joke. Which in turn because of the pressure has a higher-than-usual risk of going terribly wrong. Even for jokes that are OK in other situations.

I think the main reason why this joke gave offense has already been covered in Najib Idrissi's answer, i.e. the lingerie/sex-object angle, but there's another aspect to it:

When [Prof. X] was young, in the 1950s, he said, it was a "standard
  gag line" to ask the elevator operator for the hardware or lingerie
  floor as though one were in a department store.

Elevator operators are almost entirely obsolete now, but back in that era, many hotels, stores, and office buildings had an employee whose job was to work the elevators for guests. It was a junior role, similar to a valet or a store greeter.
So part of the "joke" here is that Prof. X is talking to Prof. Y, his professional peer, as if she was a junior hotel employee - an occupation which carries much less status than "professor".
Women in academia have had a long struggle to be treated with the same respect as their male peers, and there's still a long way to go. (One example of many). Because of that situation, it's a bad idea for a male academic to make jokes which rely on reducing the social status of his female peer; this amplifies the "merely sex objects" aspect of the joke that Najib Idrissi discussed.
A lot of comedians invoke the rule "Never punch down" - in other words, don't make fun of people or groups whose social standing is lower, or less secure, than your own.

part of the "joke" here is that Prof. X is talking to Prof. Y, his professional peer, as if she was a junior hotel employee That is not conclusive. I read the joke as self-mockery, where Prof X is pretending to be confused about where he is. Asking someone else what floor they want is similarly acceptable when two people enter an elevator without either person being employed specifically to operate the elevator. This was actually the case here: one professor asked another professor what floor they were going to so they could press the button for them. That context hasn't changed.

@Flater It could perhaps be interpreted as self-mockery, but I don't see anything in X's response where he offers that explanation. On the other hand, I quoted directly from a part of the article where X explains that this is how one used to talk to elevator operators... i.e. junior hotel/business employees.

In what way was this comment offensive?

Here is a quote from the professor in question:

"Ladies’ lingerie” is an old joke dating back to the days of manually operated elevators, when lift operators in department stores would yell out: “What floor?”. I meant no harm by my joke – a version of which even pops up in the Harry Potter books. Indeed, it was meant to be an attempt to make light of the mundane, boring process of being stuck in a lift. And why must such a comment have sexual or offensive connotations?

So it seems the joke was only offensive to those who didn't get it.  They hear the word 'lingerie' in association with a woman, and assume it's somehow a sexist or dehumanizing joke, when it wasn't intended that way at all.  The joke would have been the same if it had been a man pushing the buttons.
(Edit: the joke here is that the request can't be fulfilled at a hotel, but would be reasonable in a similar context. It'd be like getting into a race car and telling the driver "Airport Hilton, please".  It's not sexual or sexist in any way.)

What are examples of other comments that might be offensive in a similar way?  How can I avoid offending people in a similar way?

It's possible for someone to misconstrue literally anything you say as offensive, so there no way to completely avoid these sort of situations.
However, when people are offended, they give off obvious non-verbal cues.  If someone gets offended due to misinterpreting something you've said, the best thing you can do is apologize and explain to them what you meant.

@NajibIdrissi: That's oversimplifying. The answer addresses that for the current scenario, the offended parties likely did not understand the actual joke and took offense to the words without observing the actual intended context. This answer does not argue that that is a global rule where offense/humor are mutually exclusive at all times. (Ironically, overzealously assuming that a statement is implicitly a global statement is the main reason as to why this joke was considered offensive in the first place)

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. Future comments that will not directly address issues with this answer will be deleted without warning. If you want to discuss the history or exegesis of the joke, please take it to chat.

@NajibIdrissi: There is absolutely no way you could have gotten that from this answer.  It seems you only want it to be true so you can continue to take offense at something entirely non-offensive.

I agree with @NajibIdrissi. I also want to add that professor Y was only 1 of 2 women in a lift full of male professors. Based on this fact alone, "lingerie" whether preceding the word "department" or not, is inappropriate by itself, based purely on the usual association with "lingerie". Second, in old times when lifts WERE operated by attendants, those attendants were usually women, by (jokingly or not) referring to the professor who offered to press the button (who happens to be a woman) as the attendant is degrading, no matter how mild the connotation is.

First, to explain why the "joke" is "funny" (inverted commas because I don't find it funny, and I suspect many others don't either). Thanks to Flater and knzhou for explaining this.
During the time of manually-operated elevators, there were so-called "elevator operators" who would ask passengers where they were going. A possible answer for example could be "second floor". In those days, departmental stores were also organized by departments that could take up an entire floor. To say "take me to the ladies' lingerie department" is equivalent to saying "take me to whichever floor sells ladies' lingerie". The joke is that the speaker, as a man, is not expected to want to buy ladies' lingerie. The same joke would work with a female speaker asking to be brought to the men's lingerie department.
The joke is offensive because the listener didn't understand it. Since some people laughed, the listener knows it's a joke. However she didn't know why it's funny - not surprising, from the comments many don't either. Still, since 1) women and 2) lingerie were mentioned, she assumes that it's a sexual joke. That immediately makes it offensive.
Here're a couple of other situations which were interpreted badly: when a man invited a woman to coffee in an elevator, and a joke about dongles and forking at a technology conference. You can easily find more using Google for terms such as "humor in different cultures".
As to the question of how to avoid it: unless among friends, avoid making jokes entirely because humor translates poorly across cultures. This is the same reason that one should avoid injecting humor into e.g. a conference presentation. As you can probably imagine, the hassle that Prof. X is going through is not worth the laughs he got.

Allure, I'm confused why I see an answer written by you and a vote to close by you.  That has occasionally happened to me -- but when that happens, it's a good idea to provide an explanation.

@aparente001 I didn't vote to close because the question is unanswerable; I voted to close because I think it's better suited to another StackExchange. Since others evidently don't think so, I might as well answer it here, especially since at the time I wrote the answer there were some things not yet said in other answers.

FYI. You can consider retracting the Close vote option when you decide to answer a question which you already casted a close vote before it is put on hold.

@Allure - What scaaahu said -- do you want me to rephrase it?  Or do you understand what he was getting at?  It's your decision, of course; I just want to make sure you understand what your options are.  And I would like to repeat, it has happened to me too; based on experience gained over time, in such a controversial situation like this, I would encourage you to give it some more thought before jumping in to vote or to post, until you've had a chance to figure out what your position is.

Well, there was no offense intended, and initially, I didn't see how she was offended. You also can't please everyone, so it's hard to avoid offense unless you carefully curate your jokes?
The offense was taken, and I'm saying it was an over reaction, unless given other context, as it was just a topical joke, I think. I'd say "ladies lingerie" was the first floor type that came to mind, given the circumstances, and on-the-spot jokes need people to be quick on their feet.
And I'm also thinking that the joke was probably the best one that could be given. Any other options wouldn't have been enough of a non-sequitur to be as funny, possibly offered even more offense.
An alternate floor, like "Housewares", for example, might have brought to mind "Stay In The Kitchen" attitudes.
The situation is sort of like a rapid fire answer test, think Word Association and Rorschach testing?
Unless you can find something at least as odd as women's lingerie for a man to publicly state he wants, the joke falls apart.
The woman took offense because she didn't get the joke, I assume. A fault on her, instead of the speaker, due to a lack of historical knowledge.
While it might not be reasonable to expect that knowledge, I find her offense unreasonable, as I didn't immediately find a reason to take offense, unless the core of the complaint is that such a joke doesn't fit the academic setting... But, it's an elevator joke, in an elevator. I love how the situation fits, from a jokester's perspective? ... I might even say she fed him that straight line, but she didn't know it.
On having read some other answers and other commentary on the situation, I find the possible types of offense caused by the joke to be... loosely connected, I think is the right phrase? Although, there is enough connection, to find it as the first associations to come to mind, in someone unfamiliar with the joke?
If I were confronted, I'd ask for an explanation for the offense and defend the joke, but that might not be the best option for you.

The question isn't whether the woman was right to be offended, the question is how to avoid offending people. This doesn't and doesn't try to answer that question.

Explaining why something is not offensive does not answer "what was offensive" nor "how can I avoid offending people".

@Flater The OP did ask that: "how can I avoid offending people in a similar way?" The OP also specifically noted "Please refrain from using this as a place to express your opinion on who is right in this dispute. That's not what I'm asking."

@MJeffryes: Regardless of quality issues in this answer, "it wasn't actually offensive" is a valid answer (note the difference between valid and correct !) because it addresses the premise of the question; which is built on the assumption that the joke is offensive in the first place.

@hvd: My bad. The title got cut off on my browser and the question was not repeated in the body.

@Flater This answer is not useful, since the professor involved seems to have followed the course of action advised (going on the defensive), which has not worked out very well for him. OP has stated they want to avoid being in the same situation as the professor concerned, so clearly, this strategy is useless in that context. I'm going to refrain from any further extended discussion.

@MJeffryes - Where does it say that Prof went on Defensive? The quote says "the details of which he disputed". That's shifting that blame, not defending their actions as in the right. ... Gonna do more edits...

@MJeffryes: Note the difference between valid and correct. To the question "is the sky blue?", Yes is a valid (and correct) answer, No is a valid (but not correct) answer, and Carrot is not a valid (nor correct) answer. I said OP's answer was valid, not necessarily correct.

@Malandy Read the full story to see how he went on the defensive.

@TobiasKildetoft - My, that changes a lot about my answer, although, not its point? I would've summarized my answer by saying that I'm basically agreeing with the joking professor, I think. ... Not sure if we should expect answerers to have gone through the links, but whatever?

-1 A lack of intent to be offensive  does not mean that "any offense is a misinterpretation." This absolute statement is laughably false

@AzorAhai - Did I say that? Ah. I need to rephrase again. ... I need to check. I can see a way that offense could be taken just through the mention of lingerie, but that seems... something. ... Wait... What kind of offense was she saying she got?

@Malandy I'm not really sure what to make of your snarky phrasing and ellipses here. Perhaps you should read the article linked in the post.

@AzorAhai - I read it like 5 hrs ago? And now I've forgotten most of it, unfortunately, and got no time to refresh. Sorry if I came across as snarky. Hopefully some of the higher voted answers are / were more to your liking.

@MJeffryes Explaining as to why something wasn't offensive precisely answers as to what was offensive in it, namely, it answers that there was nothing offensive. This makes the second question moot. This is a perfectly fine way of answering such a pair of questions. Whether or not one agrees with the answer is a different matter but this answer is not answering a different question.

@DvijMankad Why are you trying to restart a year old discussion when I specifically said I wouldn't discuss this any further?

@MJeffryes My apologies. I hadn't noticed your second comment.

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


text:
Human-Computer Interaction PhD in Computer Science vs Information Systems: Does the department title matter?
I've been offered a PhD position in Human-Computer Interaction, but it bothers me that it's within the Business/Economics department, so it would yield me an Information Systems degree instead of a Computer Science degree. I'm afraid that this would close some doors of HCI jobs that list CS degrees as requirements. I will be doing CS work, and I believe it would be important to get such recognition.
Do you guys the title of my PhD in this case is something important, or I shouldn't be worried about it?
Thanks!

I think it would depend on the university. HCI is highly regarded and essential in many aspects of computing, but it is a bit at the cusp of CS and more general (human centered) things. It can be rich in psychology, for example.

If you are referring to high-tech industry job (vs academic jobs) I can only tell you that for me, if I'm looking for R&D, design, development roles I would hire someone with a CS degree over IS degree without even looking into qualifications. It is unlikely I will look at you resume farther than the part that mentions your degree.  Unless of course I am unable to find people and am rather desperate.
Think about it this way:  this is degree from Business/Economics department which translates into a non (engineering/technology) degree which is not what a job with CS requirement would be looking for.
But again, it depends on kind of a job you are thinking about and can't claim  that this is the view of everyone although I can comfortably say it would cut your chances a good deal for the kind of jobs I mentioned above.
Sorry if I sound harsh.

Thanks for your honest feedback! That's exactly what I had in mind, and that's why my supervisor and I will be working towards getting cotutelle from another university so that I can get a double degree as CS and IS. Do you believe that would solve the issue?

I think it would. In the least it will get your Resume past the initial screening (which in most cases is done by some admin or an intern or even an automated filter  who is just checking the boxes) and to hiring managers/people who would look at the details.


text:
Is it okay to judge projects on the basis of how long it took to develop them
I was showing my presentation on a project which I made in java/javafx to this evaluator(i'm a college student). And before I could start explaining the usage he asked me how much time did I spend on this project and I told him i did it in 20 days(which i think is a lot) . He then told me that I need to atleast spend 6 months on a project [reason being that we have 12 months to study a language which was a lie we had 9 months actually ]  and asked me to leave. He didn't even let me finish the presentation or saw what I did. So, what i'd like to know is this fair to judge a project like this or the evaluator was being unfair?

Who is he? Please clarify.

@scaaahu The project evaluator who our college hired to judge the projects.

Please clarify if he is the professor who teaches the course? The TA who helps the professor? Or someone your college hired temporily as consultant?

Well it's a fair question if what he/she saw was poor.  I have said pretty much the same thing to students who didn't put in the effort.   Basically, you haven't done enough work.  Thanks for playing.

@Prof.SantaClaus I agree what you're saying. But the only problem in my case is that he didn't even saw what i did so he could evaluate the effort. He simply asked how much time i spend on the project and then asked me to leave. I'd have no problem if he had see and say that the effort wasn't enough or the project isn't good.

@scaaahu He was hired temporarily as a consultant/evaluator.

When did the presentation happen? At the end of the 9 months?

@scaaahu yes it did happened at the end of 9 months.

Another question, before the presentation, did you put the project somewhere so others can see it? Is there any chance he could have seen it already?

@scaaahu No sir.

In the end, it will be difficult to ascertain this from a simple Stackexchange post, but I would consider it extremely problematic if the time spent is actively judged. - A good programmer is a LOT faster than a novice programmer (maybe even a bad one). So you have a programming job/project and finish it quickly due to prior experience: Should it be graded worse because you are faster? - What should be evaluated is the content, not the time taken. Case in point, I remember implementing the enigma encryption in VBA during my maths degree as coursework - someone else wrote their thesis on it.

Now I did not read the thesis and I hope it contained more details on how enigma was cracked too, calculations on complexity etc. - But the implementation part is - in reality - nowadays pretty trivial.

Orders of magnitude usually matter. However, I doubt the question would have appeared if the software were satisfactory.

Charitably, it sounds like you put in about 200 hours of work during a nine-month period. That works out to maybe five to six hours per week. That may not meet the minimum “level of effort” expected for such a project. The evaluator may be well within his rights to terminate the evaluation at that point, particularly if this is a “project course” that amounts to a significant portion of your total credit load for the semester. Is it fair to do so? Probably not. Is it allowed to so? Quite possibly.

To the downvoter, I failed to see the wrongness of this answer. Would you care to explain?

@scaaahu The voter might just not like the answer. Unfortunately grading is one of those imperfect messy things that will always be ugly and messy.


text:
Where should a glossary be placed in a book?
I am writing a book for a technical industry. I'm planning on including a glossary, I wanted to know, should I place this at the beginning of the book or at the end of the book?

There is no "correct" answer here. It really depends on what your goal is: if it's to inform the audience of terms before they start reading the main text, then it might make sense to place it in the "front matter." On the other hand, if you expect readers to consult it as needed when they're reading, then typically you'd place it at the end of the book with the appendices.

The publisher might also have something to say about this.

Yes, beginning or end as long as it is not missing...

Virtually all books I've seen with a glossary (easily in the hundreds --- including quite a few of my pre-university and university textbooks in most every subject) have the glossary at the end, usually before the index. However, the beginning might be a better choice for the OP's situation, but this decision requires a lot more specific information about the book, and it's likely that the decision is not entirely up to the OP (as @Buffy suggests).


text:
Statement of Purpose for going back to school years after graduating
Background
It's a rather uneventful story, but I think nobody can come up with a relevant answer without knowing where I'm coming from. Thanks in advance for reading through this!
I finished my Bachelor studies in 2012 with a degree in Systems Engineering. My studies were supposed to be about robotics and industrial automation, but due to little to no financing (think Eastern Europe) it was 99% theoretical with 10 different courses in math.
Even before graduating I realised I had to start making money (getting me through university was definitely tough for the family) and started working as a freelance developer. Later on I got a full-time job offer several months before getting my diploma. The pay was way over what my parents were making, so it was a no-brainer to say "goodbye!" to my studies and settle for the Bachelor's degree. Fast forward seven years, I'm an engineering manager in tech company, with significant development experience. I've been thinking a lot about what I want to do in life, and realised that my job doesn't make me happy and I was always fascinated by other things. Neither management, nor architectural carreer tracks don't excite me.
I've asked myself: "Where can I find a match between my skills - building software - and what I'm interested in - healthcare, ageing, extending human lifespan?". That's how I came to a decision to study Bioinformatics and get a MS degree.
Now to my questions for writing a Statement of Purpose:

Since my degree isn't in CS, but rather in Engineering, should I explain why I went into software development, rather than automation/robotics?
How do I convey my fitness to finish an MS program? It's been a while since I was in an academic environment, but I've been taking MOOCs recently. Is it something which can help?
How do I connect my work experience (software development) with the Bioinformatics?

I expanded the acronym SOP because I thought at first that it meant Standard Operating Procedure.  Welcome to the site!