text:
I've begun inventing a system for naming binary numbers. Is it worth writing a paper?
I'm an undergrad computer science student. In my spare time, I was playing with binary numbers and realized that there was no way to think about a binary number without either converting it to decimal, or hexadecimal, or resorting to droning off a long string of "one zero zero zero one one zero one zero."
I thought of a way to be able to name any binary number of arbitrary size using units I call Tolkiens. If anyone is interested in the details, I'd be happy to explain what I have so far, even just for curiosity's sake. I'm just wondering if anyone else thinks it's worth putting in some effort to study the need and acceptance of the new naming convention and publish a paper for the scientific community.

Part of me keeps wondering - there is a naming for binary numbers of arbitrary size. For instance, 1110 is called "14". Why is it easier to remember that it's called (say) "Oblash" and then that "Oblash" represents 14?

That's a naming convention for decimal numbers, not binary. You have to convert in order to use those names. The name "twenty-four" tells you that the visual representation is a 2 followed by a 4, i.e. 24. It tells you nothing about the binary representation.

Binary numbers are for the computers to read. What's the use case for your naming convention ?

@Nobody Well, there are some niche cases in cryptography and assembly language programming where it might be used more often, but I think that most computer science students could benefit from an alternative way of thinking about binary numbers without having to convert back and forth all the time. I wouldn't have thought of it if I didn't want it myself.

Whatever you call them, they are simply constants. Abstract concepts are more important for you to explore.

I could swear we've already had the same question ("I've invented a new system for naming binary numbers, is this publishable") either here or on MathOverflow, of course with a different naming system. Anyone remember which question I'm talking about? In any case, for sure you're not the first person to come up with such a system. I get that it was a fun experience coming up with such a system, but the reason that no such naming system is in use is that there is no need for it, not that it's difficult to come up with.

@AdamPřenosil I mean, it's not a completely useless idea, but if it's been researched before and shown to be unhelpful, then I guess I should have done more research before asking this question.

Of course, if so many members of the community I want to share my ideas with are pushing back so hard, there's probably no chance of it catching on and I'll probably just use it for myself and not put a lot of effort into the details. Maybe I'll explore the question more if I can work it into a project for one of my future classes. Thanks everyone for your input.

Probably the main reason you're getting such hard push back is because you asked if you should write a paper on it. Papers are for much more complicated and deeper ideas than basic naming conventions (some fields may have need of naming conventions but they'll be much more complex than this kind of convention). If you'd said "should I write a blog post", the response might have been "I don't think it will catch on, but if it helped you it might help someone else, so could be worth doing".

It's trivial to look at a binary number as an octal or hexadecimal number. Zero conversion required, and then you have all the naming you want.

Here is the other proposal that was at the back of my mind: https://forum.artofmemory.com/t/a-major-system-based-mnemonic-for-a-way-of-pronouncing-binary-numbers/77418 Incidentally, I don't understand the downvotes. The OP, as an undergrad, was not sure whether this is something that is at the level of a publishable result, so he asked in a forum where more experienced people can give him some feedback. What exactly is the problem with that? Surely people should be encouraged to ask such questions if they are unsure how publishing an academic paper works?

@AdamPřenosil Here you go: https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/165622/109931. And related questions by the same fellow.

Come on, people. This question is downvoted like it is seriously horrible. Can you name the reasons? Or is it just because a newbie doesn't know what publishing means? (+1)

Broadly, I'd say no. When you think about numbers from a mathematical perspective, there is a one to one mapping from binary/hexadecimal to decimal numbers, so you can always simplify by using that naming convention if you want to say it out loud. Research papers are for more fundamental ideas than just what to name something.
If you keep playing around with it and find it useful in a significant way, a blog post would be more appropriate. If it actually is more useful then it may get adopted, if not it will just float around with a couple of people (or just one) using the convention.

Thanks for your input. I know that it's possible to look at a number like 1001 and know that it's 9, but sometimes you don't really need to know that it's 9. You just need to know that it's 1001. And for people like me, a number like 10100110 is going to take a lot longer to transcribe if I have to convert it to decimal or remember it as "one zero one zero zero one one zero," even if I take a hexadecimal shortcut. However, "tenty-ten tolkiens, onety-ten" tells you exactly what the visual representation of the number is, even if it sounds silly. It also has other benefits but i ran out of space

If you're talking about these numbers a lot, you'll probably be able to quickly convert to hex and back. And it requires effort to learn this new naming scheme (which isn't useful if no one around you can understand it). But when you work in research these numbers will become unimportant; they are just tools to represent deeper concepts. As an example, arithmetic becomes less important in higher level mathematics since you are interested in describing over-arching mathematical structures rather then adding some numbers together. I could also say hex A-six, which I'd find easier to remember.

But then you're relying on whoever you're talking to being able to quickly convert between hex and binary. I know it only requires memorizing sixteen binary patterns or a quick 4-bit conversion, but wouldn't it be even more helpful if each of those patterns had a unique name which also happened to describe the number's digits? We have a system for that in decimal and nobody questions it.

More likely someone in that field would know that conversion, and even if not they would be able to quickly remember the hex (since they know numbers and letters already). Also it doesn't need to be quick unless they have to write it in binary right away. If I say initialise with e5, you don't need to do that conversion until you are writing it down (and then tools/macros make this easier). And its easier to remember a string in base 16 instead of base 4 (just as base 4 is easier than base 2).

Really, the system is most useful if you have to copy a large amount of binary data and copy-paste is not available, but that's not the only time it's useful. At its core, a naming convention provides a way of thinking about binary numbers without any conversions at all. In reality, thinking of numbers in binary should be as easy as thinking of numbers in decimal or hexadecimal. But converting a 64-bit binary number to hexadecimal by hand just to shout it across the room is insanity, even if that situation only comes up once in a blue moon.

In edge cases like that, you don't need anything standardised, each group can have their own form. But also keep in mind that you are no longer thinking in binary, you're thinking in quadary since you're base 4 when you're grouping two bits together. Coming up with other names for hex numbers that are easier to associate with the binary might be more useful, e.g. 1001 is pool or something similar because there are two pillers near a hole (filled with water). Then this becomes an adjustment to hex (well known) that helps with conversion (which is your goal).

@AnthonyZeedyk PS: as a rule of thumb, it's considered best practice to wait a day or so on this site before accepting an answer, someone might come along in a couple of hours or so and write a better/more general answer than what I quickly wrote. Not really important here but just to let you know for next time since you're new ;)


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Failed one class of my undergrad major
My mother is very sick with colon cancer and I am living with her and also doing online classes at a private university in California. I felt depressed and had a lot on my mind and ended up falling behind in one of my classes, but I am on schedule in the rest with only two classes remaining. The bad part is that the class I failed says it will not be offered again until a year and four months from now, I was supposed to graduate this August. My school's catalog does say something about offering extended time for assignments in some situations, but I am missing 7 weeks worth of assignments for the one class. My school has these account representatives that call you to check in periodically, but she made it sound like the only option I had was to wait a year and four months to take the class again. I can try asking the department director to help, but I am wondering if anyone has any advice?

I don't know the rules in your university and whether your case qualifies (so, as the comment above says, ask your undergraduate office), but "taking care of a sick relative" is often a good cause for all kinds of leniency towards a student.

Since your situation is unusual, the university, through the department head, might be able to arrange a special solution. The first option that comes to mind is an Independent Study course with some faculty member who will provide some guidance and a grade for the missed course. These are common enough that it is worth talking to the department head and/or the faculty member that normally teaches the course.
Good luck with all the travails.
You might also look to the "student counseling" office, if any, to find ways to avoid depression, which can slow you down or provide a block.

Situations like yours are common, and universities have policies for them. In a population of several thousand students, every semester a percentage of those students will have a family and/or medical emergency. The call you received sounds like from a "student retention" office (or whatever the name for that office at your university.) However, the most likely person to help is the chair of the department. It varies among universities, but chairs usually have broad authority to help students in cases like yours. These include allowing a late medical/family withdrawal from the class, offering a special topics course that later is made to cover for the class you failed, negotiating with the faculty member a grade of incomplete, and other options. Besides the chair, every university has a disabilities/accessibility office or a person at the assistant/associate dean level (sometimes called undergrad coordinator) that is tasked with helping students in your situation. Again, the actual title of the person varies, but every institution has one. Just inquire about the appropriate channel at your institution, and follow their instructions. Good luck.

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what is the salary of a postdoc without PhD degree yet in netherlands
My PhD contract is about to end soon. I got a postdoc position in the Netherlands after that but I don't have the PhD degree yet. Which salary step will I get in scale 10?

The best solution would be to contact the university and directly ask them. The number may change due to individual circumstances (eg if you don't have the PhD yet), and also it is something they sure should know.

... My PhD contract is about to end soon ... How much is left? Is the PhD defence done?

You ask

Which salary step will I get in scale 10?

Although the salary scale for the Collective Agreement of Dutch Universities (CAO) is fixed, the step (trede) a postdoc would be placed on scale 10 is not constant.
It depends on numbers of factors: one is the years of experience.
Though fixed, yet negotiable! (more of the PI though getting you on 'higher' steps).
Depending on where you are with the PhD and whether your PhD status will count or not, you might be looking at 10(3) or 10(4).
Even at that, it's best to get clarity from the PI and/or HR. I'll rather go the route of 'negotiating' with the PI.
Following might be worthwhile

In the Dutch salary system, how do the "steps" ("trede") work?
Salary, collective labour agreement

In the case of the OP, 10(2) would not be implausible.

Note that a postdoc position in general requires a PhD. If all you are missing is some bureaucratic paper work you should talk to them but probably this will have no effect on your salary and they will just pay you the same as if you already have the PhD.
If however your PhD still requires a few months of work and is not actually finished yet you need to carefully check whether the offer for a postdoc position is still valid at all. In that case you want a PhD student position and that is not the same as a postdoc position.

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text:
How do I scrape citation count from Google Scholar?
I have a list of publications in a CSV file for which I need to scrape the citation count of these papers from Google Scholar. I have a code to try do this, but naturally, it does not let me scrape after going through a couple of papers. I would like some advice on how to do this. It would be useful to hear solutions to either run some code multiple times or get an API to do it. I only have some 400 papers, so would like to possibly avoid paying for that, but I would like to explore different solutions here (and also how to go about it, as I am a beginner at scraping/using APIs/etc).
This is my code:
Import libraries
import os
import json
import pandas
import re
import requests
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup

For Setting File Path
path = r'(this is the path name in my computer)'

Read CSV File and Get citation count
df = pandas.read_csv('Publications_Local.csv')
article_titles = df.title

def get_citations(title):
    url = 'https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=' + title.replace(' ', '+')
    response = requests.get(url)
    soup = BeautifulSoup(response.text, 'html.parser')

    element = soup.find('a', text=re.compile(r'\bCited by\b'))
    if element:
        citations_text = element.text
        citations_number = re.search(r'\d+', citations_text).group()
    else:
        citations_number = None

    return citations_number

for title in article_titles:
    citations = get_citations(title)
    if citations is not None:
        print(f'Article: {title}')
        print(f'Number of Citations: {citations}')
        print('---')
    else:
        print(f'Article: {title}')
        print('No citations found for article')
        print('---')

This sounds more like a question for https://stackoverflow.com/. That said, the scholarly package should serve you well.


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Is it ethical to do phd thesis about topic someone else did it before?
I have a big problem and I need your opinions and your advices.
Someone did his PHD 4 years ago using data collected over 10 years to develop some equations and simulate them. I re-measured the same data 2 years ago (i.e. spanning over 12 years; the methods of collecting the data are different) and I want to develop equations with simulating them in different program (I will do the programming of it). One of the equations was developed by him, and the two others are different. Is it ethical to continue my thesis or not? Is it considered as plagiarism? I have cited his results in the Scientific Background section, and in the Discussion I will compare it with my results.

It is not an ethical/ plagiarism problem, it is an originality problem. Ask yourself if your results enough new to be interesting.

It's ethical, but the real problem is that it might not get you a PhD.

It doesn't sound like there's an ethical problem here -- as long as you appropriately credit the earlier work. (That is, prominently cite the prior work and clearly explain the relationship.)
However, you should note that re-doing someone else's work with minor changes will generally be viewed as less significant and novel than the original work. In particular, doing almost the same analysis as someone else's PhD thesis is likely not sufficient for another PhD.
That said, it is valuable (and often publishable) to re-do prior work. This is helpful to you and the community, and could form part of your PhD.

One should add: It is often a necessary part of a PhD to redo the work of those who gone before you, in order to get sufficiently acquainted with the methods and their inherent problems, before you can contribute with something novel.

Your concerns are a bit misplaced, though you should have concerns. Plagiarism is using other people's words and maybe ideas without attribution. Speaking "their words as if they were your own."
Copyright comes in to play when using other people's words, of course, though copyright law is a mess and varies from place to place. But if you quote and attribute the earlier work appropriately you won't be in the wrong here.
But note that copyright applies to words (pictures,...), not to ideas. While I can't publish images of Mickey Mouse, I can certainly discuss the "idea" of Mickey Mouse without ethical or legal concerns.
Patent law is a bit different and allows the exclusive use of "ideas" of certain kinds for a fixed period. But that doesn't apply here.
However, to have an acceptable dissertation, you need to do something that is considered novel by (at least) those who review it at your university. Simply repeating earlier work isn't new, though it may be that you use new techniques, or come to a different conclusion. Some research can invalidate older work, and, especially when it uses better techniques than the original, is certainly valid and worth publishing.
If what you do is truly different then you have the basis for a dissertation. If it is a little bit different, you probably don't. But ethics would only be involved if you copy and present the copy as your own.
It may be an apocryphal story, but Picasso is said to have said "Good artists borrow. Great artists steal." The same sort of thing has been said of "writers", "physicists", etc. But in the case of art, no one would accuse Picasso of presenting the work of another as his own, though he did steal ideas from other artists.
Build your work on the ideas of others. But make it clear what is yours and what is "theirs."
However, another problem that might apply here is the problem of parallel work. If you work in parallel with someone else but don't know that until late in your studies, you may wind up in a situation in which your work must be discarded. There have been exceptions to this, but they are rare. If you didn't know, but should have known, you are just out of luck. However, it has happened that dissertations have been submitted by people unknown to each other more or less simultaneously. This will generally cause, at least, an investigation. That doesn't seem to be the case here, but you may be in a situation in which the other person just reached the finish line first.
The reason for that is that "ideas are free" and what I can learn, you can learn. The thoughts I can have, you can also have. The insights might be shared, etc. But if you are a bit quicker to the end than me, then you have a dissertation and I don't. Not especially frequent, but it happens.

Thank you for your comments but I should and must explain something, the previous work dealt with the topic using data from two countries.My work is restricted with one country and honestly I heard with his thesis just  last year but I found differences sufficient to continue but I am still worrying about that.When I sent my PhD proposal I did not know at all that someone did similar work.

Your advisor is your best source. Make sure that he/she has all the facts. It will be bad if you can't continue, but you may be able to salvage something even from a bad situation, though it will likely cost you time. You don't need to say it, but your advisor bears some responsibility for knowing these things, so, I hope, has an incentive to make it work out.


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School's Admissions office ignoring me after accepting admission offer
So I'm in a bit of a weird situation right now.
I recently graduated from university with my BS, but was expecting to continue my education at the school as I was accepted into a BS/MS program at the end of my junior year. I put a tremendous amount of time and effort into my work and knocked out a significant portion of my MS during my senior year.
Since I graduated I had to do some transitioning into the MS program, which consisted of proving that I actually had my degree conferred, filling out some additional paper work -- you get the idea. I filled out every form that needed to be completed, met every deadline, and so on (and have tangible proof/records of me doing so).
And yet for some reason, I'm still not in the graduate program (The offer was never rescinded or anything like that). Even though I've done all of the work I've needed to do and was already accepted, I'm simply not considered to be in the program for some reason and can't register for classes, receive financial aid, etc.
I tried desperately to solve this matter with the graduate admissions office via e-mail, phone, and in-person meetings, and yet I've been continually left without help and without answers every single time. Class registration + Financial Aid deadlines are coming up and yet it looks like I'm posed to miss them due to the admission office's neglegence towards this matter (And mind you, this is not some kind of fake/phony/fraudulent school. This is a very well-known, reputable university in the US)
It's honestly gotten to the point where I'm preparing a letter to send to the president of the school, as I've run out of people to go to for help. It's been really frustrating to have done all of this work for so long and then be treated like this, and I don't know what do to.
I'm not really sure what to ask at this point, but absolutely any help/recommendations would be sincerely appreciated. Are there any actions/repurcussions I can possibly take against the school for this? Or are there any other courses of action I should take to help resolve this matter?
Thank you.

Is there a friendly faculty member who might be able to help you? Possibly a professor for one of the MS courses you have taken?

Hi  and thanks for the reply :) I was considering this but wasn't sure if it was appropriate and if a professor would be in a position to assist with an admissions problem. Might as well give it a shot!

A professor won't be able to directly solve an admissions problem, but you have a lack-of-response problem. The admissions office may be less likely to ignore a professor.

Ahhh, I hadn't thought of it this way. I think that's a great idea :D Thank you so much for recommending this!

You may also wish to ask the chair of your department, or look for someone specifically in the graduate school administration (who you would be dealing with as soon as you are done with admissions, anyway). In short, anyone who is in an official position to be displeased with the lack of responsiveness of the admissions department is generally well-placed to put you in touch with the right person, have a word with someone they know in a senior position in that department, etc. Just make sure you have all your ducks in a row, paperwork ready at hand, etc, so you don't waste anyone's time.

It probably won't be helpful to contact the university president, who has so many responsibilities that she or he probably won't spend time on a single student. I agree with the other respondents that your department is the place to go.

Thanks for all of the replies everyone. I contacted a very nice professor of mine that I know very well and am hoping he can help me or redirect me to someone who can help me within the department. Hoping for the best!!

And I completely agree, Greg. I know it sounds a bit unusual/strange to do such a thing but I felt that I was really running out of options and people to ask for help D:

You mentioned that you tried via phone and in-person, but didn't receive answers. What did these things look like then? Did you actually speak to anyone or were you unsuccessful there? If you spoke to someone, what did they say? Have you tried escalating or being more assertive during the conversation? Failing to get results during a conversation might mean you need to change the conversation as much as it might mean you need to try something else entirely, if not more.

@NotThatGuy: All administrative assistants advised me that the head of the graduate admissions office was the only person who can help me, and that apparently the person also decided to leave the office for about a week (and will return later this coming week). I thought this was very odd given that the person will be gone for so long during such a critical time (where there are so many deadlines coming up). I told them of the situation and how serious + strange it is and became quite assertive, but I received the same answer every time -- That the absent head is the only one who can help :(

@BrianH I will also try to contact the head of my department and see if  he can help with this. Hoping he's in for the Summer. Thanks for the response! :D

There should be faculty members in the department you are to be enrolled in who are responsible for graduate student admissions and advising. These people should be able to tell you what's going on with respect to your case because, unlike undergraduate admissions, graduate admissions decisions in the US are made with the consultation of faculty members and not simply by a "central" graduate admissions office, which usually just acts as a clearinghouse for the applications.

Thanks for the response! I contacted a professor in the department who I know very well regarding this matter and am hoping for the best! :D

Don’t just contact that person if this is time-sensitive. If you need a quick response, consult the graduate officers directly—or an administrative assistant who can help you.

"graduate admissions decisions in the US are made by the department" Actually it's different in each university.  So maybe or maybe not.

@AnonymousPhysicist OK, I’ve modified the department bit but however it’s done at a particular institution, faculty input is always involved.

I agree that the department should be your first point of contact. Somebody within the department is responsible for the graduate program and should be able to help.
If that fails, many US universities have an ombudsman/ombuds office intended to help resolve difficult problems. While they can't overrule the admissions office or force them to do anything, they generally exist to help listen to your problems and assist in resolving issues informally. They may be able to suggest the best approach to getting this addressed or get the attention of the relevant office in a way that you cannot.

Contacting an ombudsman and getting a reply typically takes a rather long time (although I've never done this at a US university), and seems to be geared towards after-the-fact investigation of issues.

@einpoklum It might make sense to try to make an appointment with the ombudsman and explain the problem and the upcoming deadlines, though I have no idea whether that's an available service at the OP's university. The worst case is that they're no more help than anybody else.

It may be a case of (1) you not understanding who's responsible for what, (2) someone neglecting their responsibility, or (3) some combination of these. Since you can't directly solve (2), you'll have to work on (1) by figuring out who's responsible for each issue and who can solve it.
It will help to more precisely identify the problem. You said you're "simply not considered to be in the program for some reason and can't register for classes, receive financial aid, etc"  This will be easier to resolve if you specify who gave you this information and when, and where they get their information from. If you indeed followed all the correct procedures after your admission, you can insist that their information saying you're not in the program is inaccurate and that they help you get it fixed.
You've been assuming the admissions office has to solve the issue, but it's not clear why you assume this. The issue might be caused by a registrar's office, a dean's office, a department office, a faculty member, etc. If you're at risk of missing a deadline, talk to the office responsible for that deadline. Keep a log of who you talked to (name and position), so they won't send you back to someone you alread asked. If they tell you to contact someone who's already ignoring your contact, explain your prior contact and insist that they help you contact the person or someone else who can help. Keep talking to offices until you find somebody who agrees to solve the issue.

I would definitely agree with (1), though currently I do know which people can and should be helping me right now, and are simply not doing so :(

Also, I know that I'm not in the program because of my current status in their online system + the financial aid office telling me that they're unable to disburse aid due to said status (I'm listed as "graduated" instead of actually being in the MS program). And as for the final question of who should be solving or helping with the issue, I've been explicitly told by everyone I've talked to about the matter that the head of the graduate admissions office is the only one who can help me, and that person is out of the office and not responding to e-mails for some unknown reason :(

Don't accept being told to do what you've already done. (Trying to contact a person who isn't responding.) Insist that everyone you talk to help you contact someone who can help.

Thankfully, everything has been completely resolved with this issue and I thought I'd leave an answer here regarding what helped with this particular experience.
As many of the responders mentioned above, contacting members of my department definitely helped. A professor that I know quite well was willing to help and got the attention of the admissions office, and he was able to get their attention and worked with both me and them to get things back on track :)
Thanks again for all of the great suggestions made here. They really helped!


text:
Reprinted or Adapted?
After what type of changes must a table be considered as adapted instead of reprinted? If I reproduce a part of a table in my text (by making my own table and inserting the info) and correct some spelling mistakes, will that make it adapted instead of reprinted?

To reprint normally implies to republish something in an unaltered form from the original. In principle, therefore, any change is an adaptation of the original. If you correct an error, it could be listed as a “reprint with corrections,” but then the corrections need to be specified. Otherwise, it’s adapted.

For figures, “reprinted” (or “reproduced”)  would be unmodified and “adapted” would mean the figure has seen some changes (aesthetic, axis cropping, etc.)
For tables, though, it is less clear because you are presenting data and not a graphical object (drawing, picture, graph, etc.). If you use the table as it was originally published, “reproduced” is definitely the right term. If you merely fix spelling mistakes, “reproduced (with typos corrected)” is probably also very clear.
If, however, you create you own table by taking the existing data, adding some other information, you need to be much more precise and indicate what data is yours and what comes from previous reference(s). Depending on how much data there is and how much is modified, I can see two strategies that work well:

indicate in the caption that “Columns A, B, and C are reproduced from Ref. X (with typos fixed).”
if the layout is more complex, italicise the original data: “Data in italics is taken from Ref. X”.


text:
Graduating a year early and applying to a philosophy PHD: looking for advice!
I am currently a second year student at an American mid-ranked liberal arts college, majoring in philosophy with hopes to attend a PHD program in philosophy (in the US) and become a philosophy professor.
I have read all the advice I can find on graduating a year early, and there is some conflicting suggestions. I also find my reason for graduating early to perhaps be more compelling than some that I have seen be dissuaded on this site. To spit it out; I am a closeted transgender person, who, if I were to come out, would likely be disowned by my family whom I am currently reliant on for my tuition. I fundamentally cannot tolerate delaying being who I am any longer than I must to graduate undergrad. I need to graduate in 3 years as opposed to 4.
Some facts about my application:

I have a 3.9x gpa, 4.0 in philosophy (which I hope to keep).
I will have taken 16-17 philosophy classes, including nearly every advanced course offered.
I conducted research last summer, am writing a paper this semester that will likely be published, will conduct research this upcoming summer, and will, both semesters next year, be conducting independent research. I will graduate with a sizable amount of research experience in just 3 years.
I have been deeply involved on my campus, and have achieved a lot extracuriccularly. (Don't want to dox myself with specifics, and know that extracurriculars aren't that important, but hope that this would diminish worries about youth/maturity and being someone just interested in my discipline).

My big conflict at the moment is trying to figure out whether or not I should apply to PHD programs next year, or spend a year after graduation in a fellowship or job before going for my PHD. I suppose I may apply to both fellowships/jobs and some PHD programs next year, and then if I don't get accepted to the PHD programs I would do the fellowship and reapply to more in the next cycle, but I am really just looking for advice here.
Thank you all for reading this mess!

Is this a US question? Study in the US, that is.

Yes! I will edit that into the post, so sorry that I missed it!

Just apply. Apply widely, and apply to terminal master's programs as well as PhDs. Don't accept an unfunded or underfunded offer. Make sure you're getting good letters of recommendation. The pessimism about the job market of Alexander Woo is misplaced. You'll either come out of a PhD program as a competitive candidate for academic jobs, or you'll have a good platform for getting industry jobs (if you know how to leverage your skills and sell yourself). And if you really care about philosophy, there are worse ways to spend 5-7 years than studying it in a funded program.

Talk to your current professors.

Assuming US, it's too late to apply for most good PhD programs this year.

The academic job market in philosophy is worse than abysmal.  You should assume you will not find a permanent academic position.  Moreover, the data suggests that your chances are even worse if you do not attend a top program - though it's not at all clear that there is a causal relationship.

Sorry for the confusion, I would apply next year for the year after. I graduate in spring 22, would start fall 22 (one option), I graduate in spring 22 and start fall 23 after a fellowship of some sort (other option).

While the answer of Alexander Woo is pessimistic and likely correct, let me offer different advice.
If you want to study for a doctorate in Philosophy or any other field, then just do it. Delay is probably not needed nor helpful. If you can get accepted then start the study. Apply whenever you can to a variety of programs. Too narrow a focus can leave you without options.
Yes, the job market is bad now, but who knows what it will be like in six years. You may find that you can't get hired at an R1 university, but that is not the only option open to you. Small colleges and even community colleges teach philosophy, some of them at a high level.
No one can predict what jobs will be open to you when you finish. And it isn't impossible to move from a lower ranked place to a higher one if you are good enough and organize your professional life correctly. My opinion is that you make a mistake to assume all doors are closed and turn away from your goals prematurely. But you have to excel in what you to and you have to make appropriate professional contacts to move on.
My situation was just the opposite. It seemed like jobs would be plentiful by the time I finished my (math) degree. But the market completely crashed and I had to make do for several years. I could have moved up earlier than I did, I think, but overall my career was satisfying. You only live one life. Make the most of it. Do not accept wooden nickels.

At worst, a PhD (philosophy) will give you useful and marketable skills. You will learn to think. You will learn to write. You will have options that you probably won't have if you turn aside out of pessimism.
But try to make it happen without an unacceptable debt load.

The academic job market in philosophy is abysmal counting community college and liberal arts college positions.  One should assume that one cannot get a permanent community college position.  And stop it with the "who knows what the job market will be like in 6 years" business - in the last 30 years the academic job market in philosophy has fluctuated between merely very bad and absolutely dreadful (though it hasn't dipped to "there just are no jobs").

@AlexanderWoo, only an anecdote, of course, but I have a family member in Philosophy who has been able to build a career in that period. Someone has to get the few jobs available. You need to work hard to be the one. But it isn't limited to philosophy and it is cyclical.

"Small colleges and even community colleges teach philosophy, some of them at a high level."  But they don't hire people to teach it.  I've pointed out several times that your repeated claims it is easy to get a job at a small college or community college are nonsense.

Job market in six years can be predicted from birth rates - and they're low.

"it is cyclical."  The data says that's not true.  See the graph: https://www.chronicle.com/article/a-brutal-tally-higher-ed-lost-650-000-jobs-last-year

@AnonymousPhysicist, please stop misrepresenting what I have said. I don't claim it is "easy", much less repeated such a claim, but yes, people get hired.

If you have decided to get a PhD in the US, do apply to PhD programs during the application season of your last year of undergraduate studies.  If you do not get an offer you like, reapply later.
The number of years it takes to get your bachelors degree and your gender identity have no effect on this application timeline.


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Mathematical Equations in Research Papers and Plagiarism
Good Day - I am writing a review paper of some techniques, which involve mathematical models. The authors utilize some equations to represent their model comprised of different components. Since I need to explain their methodology, its not possible to do it without referring to their equations. So I have to add their equations in the review. I will properly cite every author's work, which makes sense as I am explaining their work.
What could be the issues I might face when it comes to plagiarism in this case?

Following up on my comments, you state that your context is writing a review article on variational approximations. There's no need to cite individual equations. The standard format might be:
"Rasmussen et al 2021 introduce the SuperVar method, which uses a factorised joint p(x, y) = p(x)p(y). Under these assumptions, they show that
[ equations ].
They also bound the variance of the SuperVar estimator as
[ equations involving a,b,c ]
where a,b,c are some things."
Since this is a review article, there's no a priori expectation that any equations/results are your own. So much so that if you were to give any of your own results, I'd point that out, rather than pointing out equations from other papers.

Yes - At the start of paragraph, I write it like this "In order to tackle the issues pointed above, abc et. al [14] proposed another algorithm, named ... "  ---- after some details, I present their methodology, which basically includes how they setup the priors, posteriors and estimations. Usually, there are around 6-7 equations per paper, but as far as I see it, its necessary to include the equations, because of the nature of papers under discussion.

Plagiarism is representing the work of another as you own. You aren't doing this here if you properly cite the work, so no, it isn't plagiarism. Just make sure that your citation is somehow "attached" to the equations, perhaps by using appropriate phrasing when including them in addition to the citation. "The following, from the paper:...".
Don't confuse simple copying with plagiarism. Even paraphrasing can be plagiarism if it isn't cited.
I'll also assume here that you don't have copyright issues (copying too much from covered works), since there are some exceptions for mathematical work. But copyright and plagiarism are, again, different issues.

Since you will properly cite every author's work, you shouldn't face any plagiarism issues. Just make sure to explain that the mathematical models include the equations you present. For instance:

Alice, Bob, and Charlie propose a mathematical model comprising Equations (1)-(3) [ABC21].

You can then go on to explain a bit more about the model and present each of the equations. It is absolutely clear to the reader that each of those equations belongs to Alice, Bob, and Charlie, rather than you.

Actually, there are around 20+ such models which I am summarizing. So every review starts typically like:
Author ABC proposed a methodology based upon Variational Approximation. The factorization is given by the following equation:
---eq. here----
Moreover, the model uses the prior given below, which in turn is a Gaussian with parameters a,b
--- eq. here ----
So against a review, I have around 5,6 equations which I copy, but try to tweak these a little based using different alphabets/letters.
However not all the time, its possible to change tweak the equations.

@rockstone435 Ultimately, your exact presentation will depend on your exact requirements. With 20+ models, I expect categorisation into several sections. Each section can open with a brief overview, perhaps explaining any commonalities and tweaks, e.g., mentioning using different alphabets/letters. Thereafter each subsection can introduce a different model. Rather than explicitly referencing Equations (1)-(3), you could simply mention that each subsection contains equations from the original authors, except when you state otherwise. You are then free to simplify/tweak equations (and say so


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Math journal question - long publishing delay
My paper was accepted for publication in May 2019. Almost two years later, it still has not been published. Other papers which were submitted and accepted after mine have already been published. What's going on here? Should I email the journal to get an estimate for when my paper will be published? I feel a bit pathetic to have to send them an email to ask "golly gee, when are you going to get around to actually publishing my paper." Any advice would be appreciated.

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/55665/what-does-the-typical-workflow-of-a-journal-look-like

Do not send a mail to the journal; send it to the editor that handled the paper. They are an academic, so they are going to be more sympathetic and understanding of your deadlines and external constraints. In addition, they have at least some limited power to insist with the production team, and they have a direct interest in their journal's reputation.
And if there is someone that should feel pathetic, I believe, it's whoever receives your e-mail. Two years is really unacceptable even for fields with slow publication times; at least the paper should have appeared as published online (with the word "published" attached to it clearly).


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Choosing PhD advisor between Professor X and an Assistant professor Y who was a PhD student of the professor X
I got accepted in two different US schools for CS PhD programs. My prospective advisor/supervisor for the two schools are Professor X and Professor Y respectively. Professor Y was a PhD student of Professor X. Professor X has a lot of successful PhD students coming out of his lab and he is a heavyweight in the field. Professor Y is a tenure-track assistant professor but has really good recent A* publications. How should I approach this issue of choosing one of them?

(Moving from comment to answer)
This may not be true everywhere, but when faced with a similar decision I was told that the more established professor is more familiar with the department politics and how to get students graduated. Graduation should be a top priority, and if Professor X has a good track record of graduating students, that may be the best choice. Professor X also may have heavily influenced Professor Y's work, so it is unclear how Professor Y will work without Professor X's supervision.

Let me suggest that Professor X is probably safest, other things being equal. There is a danger in having untenured professors, like Y, as an advisor since their first priority is to earn their tenure and it can easily get in the way of properly advising students. You won't contribute much to their tenure, and so they need to focus on their own work.
Not every such situation is bad, but it is better to have someone who has the flexibility to help you succeed without the weight of an important career point looming. And if, for some reason, an untenured advisor fails to earn tenure, either during or after your studies it will cause issues for you.
I once had an untenured prof as advisor and found exactly this problem. I was far down the list of his priorities.
Inexperience can also be an issue in some cases.

How exactly a professor get tenured? Isn't it directly related to number of successful graduate students his lab produces? I don't understand how advising students could get into the way in their tenure? What you mean by their own work?
Thanks a lot for the answer Dr. @Buffy

The biggest factor, in most research universities, is the number of publications (first author, sole author). Everything else has lesser weight. If they "get behind" in production, their students can suffer from lack of attention. It isn't an absolute, but the forces push in that direction.

In my field the only way to get tenure is by publishing papers with your grad students (there's no one else to do the research...). This is typical for the natural sciences in North America. I think mathematics might be a special case that is different in that regard (I don't know where CS falls).


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How to appeal against an unfair decision - conference paper
My papers were rejected from a top conference venue in computer science due to laughably fallacious arguments. The reject decisions were based upon the following comments:

The one's complement checksum of an all zero bit sequence is zero!
O(n2) can be more efficient than O(n), because for n = 0.9, 0.92 < 0.9 !

What should I do now?

Note that, although comment 2 is expressed in a ludicrous way (we only care about positive integer n, and the smiley for crying out loud), there is a significant point there. A linear time algorithm is not necessarily faster than a quadratic time algorithm for inputs that we care about. For example, 10n^2 < 500n for all n < 50.

Firstly, O(0.9) is a meaningless notion. Although I agree with your point, O(n) represents an upper bound on the growth rate for big n.

Reducing the complexity is a fair contribution.

"O(0.9) is a meaningless notion" That's not correct. It's the same as O(1) [constant time algorithms].

Only O(1) represents a constant complexity. You can't put a number for n, big O denotes a growth rate.

@Christof You seem extremely defensive about anything that you perceive to be a criticism of your work. I never said anything at all about the quality of your contribution. I couldn't possibly say anything about the quality of your contribution because I have no idea what your paper says. All I said is that, in practice, a linear-time algorithm is not necessarily faster than a quadratic one. That is indisputably true. It is a point that one of your reviewers made. You should consider whether it is a relevant point, even though your reviewer said it in a ridiculous way.

@Christof Furthermore, the call for papers says "Theoretical papers must make a convincing argument for the relevance of the results to secure systems." So, actually, reducing the complexity on its own doesn't seem to be a fair contribution to this particular conference unless you can argue that it's practically, as well as theoretically relevant.

Constant term is a fuzzy thing and depends on many factors, such as the programming code, hardware, etc. Following your comment, for some n, O(n^1000) can even perform much better than O(n). I'm not sure if any one compares big O notations for small n. Last but not least, for small n, we use other measures such as cpb, rather than big O to compare the performance.

"Only O(1) represents a constant complexity."  This is not correct.  While I can't think of a case where it's not appalling writing to use, O(0.9) means the growth rate of the function "0.9", that is, of the function constantly equal to 0.9, and so is the same as O(1).

Even if you believe that the reviewers are idiots, there is no appeal phase in most CS conferences once the decision is final. BTW this conference had a rebuttal phase, which already gave you a chance to state your claims. It did not work before. Just let it go.

Christof, you are mistaken that $O(0.9)$ is not a thing that is permitted. It's perfectly allowed, it's just no one writes that way because it doesn't actually add any information more than $O(1)$. 2. The lack of knowledge of the constant factor in front is a major drawback of Big O notation.

For example, one can compare two direct methods for linear systems. One famous one is $O(n^3)$; a less famous one is $O(n^{\log_2(7)})$. It might seem that the latter is faster. But the former has a constant of $1/3$; the latter has a constant which is huge. This constant is so large that for any reasonable $n$, say $n$ small enough that $n^2$ double precision numbers will fit in 10 GB of memory, the first algorithm is still superior. Perhaps this could be reversed if, say, you were dealing with a matrix that takes 10 TB to be stored. But that's a problem for another decade.

In future, consider giving definitions of important concepts. E.g., if it is critical that 1-complement checksum of all zeroes is not zero, you could give the definition of 1-complement checksum in your paper to avoid misunderstanding.

@AlexeyB. That's good advice in general. However, in this case, the referee's comment is, almost literally, "But 1-0=0 !" No amount of definitions is going to stop that kind of mistake!

@David It is likely that this reviewer does not know or remember what this checksum is. I also do not know, and some legitimate readers may not know.

During my PhD I considered sending a complaint email to the programming committee after really bad reviews and unfair decision. My supervisor's response was: "The only thing that comes out of sending the PC chair a frustrated complaint email is bad reputation".

Perhaps (and probably not on this site) you could show the "code" where the reviewer's "error messages" were generated?

What you need to do is to understand why your paper was rejected. I'm pretty sure your paper was not rejected from what you describe as "a top CS conference" for such obviously false reasons. Reviewers don't decide whether the paper is accepted or rejected: they advise the programme committee. The programme committee evaluates the reviews before coming to a decision and a review containing such obviously nonsensical comments will carry very little weight. If your paper was rejected because of the reviews, it was the other reviews, not this one.
Note also that, at top conferences, many papers are rejected simply due to bad luck. Usually, there are many papers that are a good enough quality to be accepted but the conference isn't big enough to take all of them. The actual reason for rejection may just be "We liked your paper and it's of essentially the same quality as papers we accepted, but there just wasn't room for yours and we liked these other ones just slightly more."

My paper was rejected from ACM CCS. And the review comment was only that one single line (plus some biased quantifiers), even after rebuttal.

@Christof The nonsense review was not the reason for rejection. You received other reviews, right? What did they say?

I had only 2 reviewers, both nonsense, fallacious reasoning. I'm wondering why pc members couldn't note it. I know that this is a small community and I don't want to damage my reputation.

You believe your paper was rejected for reason X. It was not rejected for reason X. I suggest you discuss it with your advisor or with a colleague who's familiar with your paper.

Thanks for the advice, but this is not the answer to my question. I'm wondering what the best act is In such instances.

The best act is to understand why your paper was rejected.

As a conference reviewer, I have seen co-reviewers do sloppy work. Very sloppy work.It's the job of the PC to keep quality control on that. If they do not do it, and let clearly inane reviews through on a systematic (occasional slips happen!) basis, it's not a good conference, or it's on the way of becoming one that's not good. Look for a better one.

It sounds like you've already gone through the rebuttal process, so as far as I know, there's no further appeal. I'm going to focus on what seems like the core issue: what do you do if your paper is rejected for reasons that are utterly stupid?

Take a deep breath (or whatever your preferred calming action is). Rejection is a big part of being an academic; it's never pleasant, but learning how to handle it well is absolutely necessary to survive. That doesn't have to mean shrug it off; have a coping mechanism for handling rejection, and use it. (As an aside, I think it's something that doesn't get discussed enough when talking about career choices; I've known people who would have been fine researchers and teachers, but would have been destroyed by how much they had to deal with rejection.)
Take some time (a day or two, or a week) away from the issue to get some distance. During that time, feel free to be furious and vent (to appropriate audiences) about how stupid the reviewers and PC were.
When you're ready, come back to the reviews. Retread them carefully; it's quite easy when you're angry to misread a comment that gives important context as a vapid criticism. This time, read as charitably as possible. Consider that you might misunderstand something important; consider that they might have said something unclearly; consider that their comment is confused because they're confused about something in your paper.  Someone in your audience read your paper and had this response; they may well have misread your paper in a stupid way, but even so, that's something you need to fix, even if it seems blindingly obvious that they're wrong, because if one person had that misunderstanding, it's quite likely other readers too.
If you really can't make sense of the review, ask a colleague. Don't ask them "can you believe how dumb this review is?", ask, "I'm really not sure what this review is saying, could you give an outside perspective?"  If your colleague can't make sense of it either, then you can throw up your hands about it. The reviewer really did screw up, either by having stupid comments, or by writing them so unclearly that they can't be deciphered.
Revise, resubmit, and move on. Rejection is part of the lifestyle.

+1 for the second half of point 3 - this is vitally important and far too few people see it this way. Same thing for people writing furious rebuttals as letters to the editor explaining how the referee got it wrong: the clarifications need to go in the text of the paper, where they can prevent others in the audience from making the same mis-reading as the referee.

As a way to help the OP get some perspective on the problem, I recommend http://shitmyreviewerssay.tumblr.com/. After a few good laughs, you may be able to read the reviews of your paper with less emotion.

First, Wrong decisions are made everywhere, everytime in the academia. Calm down.
Second, as far as I know about CS conferences, once a decision is made, there's no chance to appeal against a rejection. However, you may want to send your paper to another conference. Eventually it'll be accepted. Sometime, somewhere.

That is correct, but I feel I can't choke on it. the review comments are not only unconstructive but are also fallacious. This makes me a lot of doubts in the review system and the role of pc members.

Roll your eyes. Shake your head. Invent a not-so-nice designation of those reviewers. Then, move on, and find someone else who can appreciate your work more.

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How is a dissertation plan written and how to learn writing it
I am a Law student with an Economics Background (School of Economics, Department of Economics, Economic Theory and Policy)
I have a dissertation to write on Spatial and Urban planning. I have an Interdisciplinary Subject (Law and Economics).
Today is day 1 and I was told to write a plan (I was told just these couple of words).
I know how to solve differential equations because the teacher spent a lot of their time actually teaching it substantially. They didn't just hand out the problems and say solve them.
Isn't there a general methodology (recipe, algorithm) for actually writing the dissertation plan; what is it?
They spent much more time explaining references and citations (a procedural triviality because in the end we can learn the way just from glancing at the textbooks almost every textbook has the same way to make references and citations).

Did you ask your instructor? What did they say?

@BryanKrause "No one knows how to write a dissertation from the start. Everyone learns by writting. Practice makes Perfect." it seems to be pretty much like handing out a Problem Set and waiting until the students "learn" figure out how to solve the equations on their own. After a lot of insisting on not knowing what to do/ what to write I got the advisor to at least help me figure out if said equation is an ODE or a PDE.

Please don't consider references and citations a triviality.  There are two reasons.  First, there arr several "right" ways to do these, and your institution has almost certainly picked one of them.  Second, an error could end your academic career.

@BobBrown I could end up in jail for Plagiarism. But the "suggested" or "preferred" text books all (almost) follow the same way to make citations.

Surely your institution or department prescribes something like the APA or MLA form.  If not, pick one and include it in your plan.  (In the U.S. you won't go to jail for plagiarism, but you might get dismissed from your program.)

What is your research question?

@padovapadova What do you mean research question? My dissertation is on Planning Law (economic analysis of expropriation and similar concepts). Law and Economics. The "question" basically is do these concepts make sense is the a better (more efficient economically) alternative without risking undercompensation or undue and unwarranted government actions (actions with a social deficit not even Kaldor-Hicks improving)

Does your institution have something called a Dissertation Guide?  If this is an American university, I'd be surprised if they didn't.  Such a document won't tell you anything about the research content of a dissertation, but it ought to tell you how to organize yours.  In other words, it should tell you the deliverables you will have to produce for a successful dissertation.  Although Stack Exchange discourages links in answers, here is an example of what I'm talking about: https://computing.nova.edu/doctoral/documents/dissertation_guide.pdf
Once you know the deliverables you have to produce in a finished product, you can make that plan you were asked for.  It might start out something like:

Dissertation idea paper: Months 1-2
Research on XXX (as described in idea paper): Months 3-4
Dissertation proposal: Month 5
...

You should be able to produce a start on something like that pretty quickly, but note that the bullet list above is specific to one institution. You will also need more detail than some one-line bullets.  You can then ask your advisor whether that's on the right track.  If so, you're golden.  If not, one can hope you'd get guidance on what's wrong.
Let me say it again... the example is from a specific institution.  You should find the similar document for your own institution and not try to use what's in the link.

Stack Exchange discourages links in answers ... really? SE discourages link-only answers but not links in answers afaik


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Career progression paths for a Postdoc
I'm preparing for a PhD interview and there is one question that I'm not too confident to answer, which is if they asked where do I see myself in 5-10 years or what I plan to do after my PhD.
I know I want to remain in science and do research in molecular biology, so I would do a Post Doc but I'm curious about it because I have heard that there are many levels of it but I'm not too sure what these are. Is there a list of them I could go through and see which suits me most? I'm sorry if this is confusing but I'm a bit clueless about it too.
Also during one of my interviews I was asked about becoming a lab leader. To be honest, right now, I feel that I won't ever be ready for that and I would prefer not becoming a lab leader although it seems like the very final step in the research career. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong but I have seen most lab leaders to be stuck with paperworks, applying for grants etc and they rarely ever work in the lab. My desire is to enjoy doing experiments and I feel that being a lab leader is such a huge responsibility. I kind of wish I could be a Post Doc... forever? Or maybe one day I might feel the need to have my own lab, but how to answer such question without putting yourself at disadvantage?
Many thanks for your help! I know I sounds like a naïve student with all these ideas (which might not be realistic), but because that's exactly what I feel like I am at the moment that I need to know anything relevant about further studies and Post Doc is still such a grey area for me. I know at some point it's all going to be a battle for money...

"where do I see myself in 5-10 years" — The correct answer is "Tenured."

Being a post-doc means very little pay and no job safety. These are supposed to be temporary positions, more akin to internships. What you want to be is a research professional.

@JeffE: The OP is not asking about 5-10 years after his postdoc, but 5-10 years after starting the PhD. "Tenured" is not a likely outcome in biology

@user8001, thank you, this is probably what I'm looking for. Is research professional a next step after the Post Doc, and before the professor? I'm sorry if I'm wrong, I still have this exact division of degrees, like BSC, MSc, PhD etc.

@HoldenDK there are staff researchers and similar positions.

@aeismail: I think it's "5-10 years from now", and the OP has yet to begin the PhD.  "Tenured" is indeed... not likely.

@aeismail A three year postdoc plus a 5-6 year tenure ramp is within the 5-10 year window, though admittedly at the far end of it.

@NateEldredge: You're right. I left out "starting" in my comment. . . .

Get ready for the part where you stop doing most of the research and start fighting for the money to fund the people who do if you want to work as a professor. Other options are to find a pure research track and not teach (like I do). These positions are often follow a progression like Research Associate, Research Scientist, and Senior Research Scientist. Though, there's a fair amount of grant chasing and personnel management on this track, too, and no tenure so job security is based on winning grants regularly.

Thank you. What you described is pretty much what I would prefer to do too. I don't want to teach. So, just to clarify, the pure research track has no tenure but the pathway with professorship offers tenure?

@HoldenDK, in the US, that is common, though I don't think it's universal. Some teaching tracks don't offer tenure at all, and some research tracks offer professor titles which may or may not include tenure. It depends on the university or university system.

In answer to you first question...there aren't formally different levels of Postdoc positions (you'll see references to 'Senior Postdoc,' say, but those are rarely job titles). Essentially, a Postdoc is a position in which you work with a lab boss (called PI, Principal Investigator, in many fields), but also assume larger responsibility than as a Ph.D. student (first author of papers often, help with grant applications, oversee graduate and undergraduate students, ...).
It's a product of the pyramidal structure of academia - not enough tenure track positions for the amount of Ph.D.s graduating, so we need to park them and further sieve some out. To a lesser extent, as going directly from a Ph.D. to tenure track and lab boss can be hard, it provides further training with less pressure than being a tenure track academic right away.
The salary ranges from decent to abysmal, depending on field and school. In some fields, one Postdoc (often lasting 3-6 years) is deemed sufficient to apply for tenure track positions; in others you might have several such positions first (often shorter then, maybe 3 years each). So I think JeffE's comment isn't necessarily off, with one modification - say that you see yourself either in a tenure track position, or seriously thinking about where to go for one. Once you're part of this system, you're likely to re-evaluate wanting to be a "Postdoc forever." These long years prepare you for tenure track, and you'll be eager to finally do your own thing with full responsibility even if this now appears scary.

Thank you very much. This is exactly what I need to know, about the system and how it really works from someone experienced. I will look deeper into the tenure track.

"there aren't formally different levels of Postdoc positions"  There are in Australia.  One typically starts at level A as a postdoc.  B can also be like a postdoc.   Levels C-E are more like professor positions.

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text:
What if MS advisor pad his wife's name into my conference and journal publications?
My MS advisor who is a tenured professor in a US school is padding his wife's name into my publication papers. His wife is an PhD candidate from the same department too and she didn't have any contribution on my research work. This is ethically and morally wrong but as the advisor is my thesis committee chair and I want to do my defense in coming month, I haven't opposed his idea yet. What I could do in this scenario? (He submitted one paper in a conference already with her name as second author and I am working to submit another in a transaction- he insisted her name to put in the second author position)

Are other faculty aware that this is happening? Do you have any allies in the faculty?

How would you know that his wife has not contributed?  She could have come up with the idea.  At the very least, he and her would have 'discussed' your paper.  Proving that she has not contributed will be very difficult.  As an aside, my old colleague had this rule: if you are in the same room when the paper is discussed, you are a co-author.

I haven't discussed any this issue to any faculty yet. I have professional good relationship with other faculty members but not sure how discussing this with them will affect my upcoming thesis. @Buffy

Well for start, I never discussed anything related to my research with her despite I am the one who is working on this research topic and coming up with the major ideas.  I understand what you are saying but this is highly debatable and question the whole idea of authorships in academia @Prof.SantaClaus

Discomforting situation indeed. Assuming what you have sketched is true, you should refuse accepting that behaviour. But the "How to" is the complicated part.... Did you try asking kindly why she is being added to the authors list?

No I didn't ask him as that could lead to a conflict and my thesis defense is in coming month. @Alchimista

How did it end? million-dollar court case? the wife is a succesful politician/academian/surgeon?

@EarlGrey not even close to a million-dollar :)
I changed my lab and professor's wife is now an assistant professor in his husband's university. She is co-authored in two of my paper where she didn't contribute a bit.

This sort of "guest" authorship is not unheard of. For instance, that may be why Chinese universities primarily give credit to the first or corresponding authors of papers (as opposed to other authors, who may be "guest" authors).
Assuming your description of the situation is correct, including another PhD student who had little to no contribution as the second author, especially one with a personal connection to the advisor, is definitely ethically questionable. It's good that you noticed and disagree with it.
Practically speaking, it's much easier to raise this issue after you have graduated and received any recommendation letters you need from your advisor. For instance, if indeed you are submitting in a few months, you could delay submission of the papers until afterwards. Alternatively, even if you submit a paper with a non-contributing second author, as the first author you will still receive the primary credit from any applications of your CV.

Any idea about how to raise the issue after graduation? @Elodin

What are you seeking to achieve? If you feel your colleague is doing something you consider ethically wrong, you don't work with them in the future.

You can be a bit more forceful about keeping someone off the author's list if you aren't relying on the advisor for passing your defense and getting a recommendation letter for your next job. Ultimately, it can get as ugly as either of you let it; if one author doesn't want it published, they can easily complain to a journal to stop publication. This is why ideally, authorship should be discussed before the authors start working on the project.

I am here seeking advice to do the right thing as the advisor's this particular act is wrong and I am in a really vulnerable position to confront him for this act at this moment. I won't work with him in future for sure though. @rg_software

Then the right thing would be not to confront him (since you are in a vulnerable position), and not to work with him in the future. You might want to see some justice, but practically speaking it is nearly impossible to prove anything. If the lady in question is his wife, they presumably talk, so he can always claim that his ideas are largely her ideas as well.

The situation you describe is known as the "White Bull effect" and was for example described here:

"Junior researchers can be abused and bullied by unscrupulous senior
collaborators. This article describes the profile of a type of serial
abuser, the White Bull, who uses his academic seniority to distort
authorship credit and who disguises his parasitism with carefully
premeditated deception. Further research into the personality traits
of such perpetrators is warranted."

what you can do? In your current situation: Most likely nothing. You can hardly win anything but lose a lot. But on the brighter side, in most fields only the first and the senior authorship count anyway (for exactly the reason described in the paper above).


text:
"A revised version of this preprint was accepted" Meaning?
I would like to know what does "a revised version of this preprint was accepted for the journal ESD." mean? Does it mean that there is 100 percent chance that the revised version of this paper will accepted and the final paper will also be accepted? Or there is a chance of getting the paper rejected?

"accepted" should really be "accepted for publication" in such sentences.

It means that in the time interval from when the preprint was uploaded and now, the paper has been revised and this revised version has been accepted for publication at the journal. In other words, the revision and acceptance have already happened, though the journal may not (or may) have published it yet.

"Accepted by X" means the revised article has made it through peer review and will be published by journal X, unless some very unusual and unforeseen circumstance arises (for example if it is discovered there is a major problem that invalidates the entire paper which was missed by the referees). The accepted version may still be slightly different from the published version due to edits made in the proof stage (e.g., copy-editors may find typos or undefined acronyms).

My reading is that the accepted version can be substantially different from the preprint.

@VladimirF The version before peer review can be quite different from the accepted version, while the accepted version should be very similar to the published version. Different people/fields have different standards for what gets posted on a preprint server (eg some people will post an accepted or published version), but if the version on the preprint server is before peer review then yes, it can be quite different from the final version.

authors: Vladimir F Героям слава


text:
How much emphasis is given on past research publications while evaluating postdoctoral grant proposals?
I am writing a project proposal for the JSPS postdoctoral fellowship in Japan. In my PhD I had 3 first author research papers with average impact factors (betwen 2.5 and 5.5) in my field (heterogeneous catalysis). I had some co-authored papers in slightly better journals.
My question is- how much emphasis is given to the strength of the proposal itself compared to the past publications? Can a good research proposal be undermined by average quality of research papers in the past?

Realistically I don’t think anyone really knows what JSPS values in applications, my experience and from talking to others is that it can be quite arbitrary.

Thank you for sharing your experience


text:
Missed online exam, Is there anything I can do?
Prior to this morning, there was no indication that the exam would only be at a specific time window. Nothing on the syllabus, class schedule, calendar, announcements.... I could go on. Nada- nothing until this morning. We only knew in advance that it was today and what it covered. There is no meetup or log on time for this class. Because of this, I assumed that it would be due before 11:59 PM just like all our other assignments and didn't set an alarm. Woke up and realized I missed it. This is our first exam and it's worth 20%. Emailed the professor explaining that I'm a transient student and that I missed it due to the reasons above. At my home institution, all my online professors told us at least the day beforehand about the start and end time of their exams.
As expected, our professor replied, saying that I need a valid excuse (understandable). I take Sertraline and it commonly affects my sleep. I haven't really been taking it like I should be and I think I might be going through withdrawal. But, that's a whole different story and I'm not sure if that would be classified as a severe illness to even be considered a valid excuse. So, I don't know if I should even try to fight this and try to get proper documentation. The earliest that I'm able to go to my doctor is on the 6th.
I'm sorry, that I'm a bit all over the place. I'm just overwhelmed by the idea of fighting this, or if I even can.

How’d this turn out and what did you end up doing?

Little you can do beyond appeal to the professor.
But perhaps your institution has an ombuds who will intervene on your behalf, or an office that deals with exceptions for people with medical (and/or) other conditions.
Since it is the first exam, if you show a completely different profile in subsequent exams and other work, perhaps the professor would be willing to give you a higher overall grade than your average indicates. That happened to me once. Every grade was better than the one before and I wound up with an A for the course despite failing the first exam.
No guarantees. You may just have to live with it.


text:
I received a referee report that was not properly redacted
Recently I had a paper sent back to me (rejected) with two referee reports. This is not that surprising as this was a very good journal. The problem is that the identity of one of the referees is revealed even though it's supposed to be a single-blind system. This wouldn't be too much of a problem usually, but the identity of the referee turns out to be one of my letter writers, and someone I've worked with closely.
This creates a very awkward situation for me. Any advice?

What do you want to accomplish?

what is very awkward? did the referee you know said anything offensive, wrong or are they being deceiving with you?

Clearly the poster is worried about managing their future interactions with the referee, but there is another consideration here: the journal! They will almost certainly regard this as a disastrous mistake on their behalf and will greatly appreciate being told about the violation of anonymity.

I would suggest an email to the editors "Dear Editor, I would like to let you know that the identity of referee XXX was visible in the email you forwarded to me, which I presume was not intended. I have no intention of taking any action based on this information, since I consider their comments to be reasonable and fair; but I thought I should notify you in order to avoid any further accidental disclosures in future". [Speaking as a journal editor, if one of my journals was revealing referees' names to authors I would definitely want to know about it ASAP.]

Maybe I overlooked something here, but it's not clear to me how the referee's identity was revealed. Was the report signed? Did the editor accidentally include the referee's name in the email forwarding the reports? Did some of the content of the report allow you to deduce the referee's identity? Or what?

@AndreasBlass the referee essentially said something like "in my paper with..." in the report, which clearly identifies them.

@DavidLoeffler very important point, likely to be the only relevant point, since the review was single-blind

Let it go.
They were doing their job. If their commentary was fair there is nothing for you to do here, but forget about the incident. This is a rather explicit case, but in the future there will be many cases where you can quite accurately infer the identity of a referee. Some of those referees will be people you know, some reports will be negative. It something you have to (learn to) deal with.
If their comments where exceptionally harsh to the point of them clearly not respecting you or your work, then it may be better to remove them from your list of letter writers.
(As an aside, if they are writing letters for you, it would probably have been better if they had recused themselves from reviewing your work.)

the report actually wasn't negative at all. If anything it was positive, and I believe the paper was rejected mostly because the other report explicitly said to do so. However, if the identity of the referee wasn't revealed normally I would simply forward the email to that person and ask for advice on where to send the paper next. This is obviously not really possible to do now without potentially creating a lot of unnecessary and unwanted drama.

@anonymousx What kind of drama are you envisioning would arise from forwarding the email with a note like "Hi X, thanks for your report on (manuscript). I particularly appreciated your suggestion to improve (blabla). Unfortunately, the paper was rejected. Do you have a suggestion for what journal we should try next?".

@anonymousx Per my comment on your question, you need to make your goals clear in your question, not approach this sideways in the comments. If the problem is "Normally I would send the reviews to Prof X and ask their advice on where to send the paper now, but now this will reveal that I know Prof X was one of the reviewers", or whatever is the actual problem you face here, say it! You might know it in your head, but if it's not clear in the text of your answer we can't easily guess at it.

@anonymousx why would you need to reveal you know who it was? Given that their review was both fair and positive, I don't see why revealing you know they reviewed it is a problem anyway, but if you feel it is, just copy/paste the contents of the rejection letter and remove their name when you send it to them.

TimRias' answer properly addresses how to feel about the referee.
As for the broken anonymity, could this be a case where the referee signed their report? Some journals will respect a referee wishing to break anonymity in this way. If that is not the case and the journal inadvertently leaked the referee's identity then I would suggest pointing this out to the editor in case they can take steps to avoid such situations in the future. (The fact that only one of the referees' identity was included rather than all makes a signed report more likely.)

There is a good rule: "If in doubt, do nothing."
Other people believe that you should notify the editor. I wouldn't do that, as you cannot be sure the editor would not notify the referee, and that would be more awkward :-)
I don't see how the current situation is awkward for you, unless you let the referee know what you now know. Actually, you just obtained some valuable information. If we knew what other people say about us behind our back, we might lose some illusions, but I am not sure this would be a bad thing :-)
The only thing you may wish to do is consider if you should ask this person to write support letters for you, although you cannot be sure other potential letter writers say nicer things about you behind your back :-)

The review is single-blind, so the reviewer had nothing against reviewing your paper knowing you were the author. In their eyes, then, there is nothing awkward.
In fact, if the review was fair, there is no issue. The double blind is in place to avoid bias, but if the referee did a good job (i.e. a fair review, without bias) then no problem.


text:
How long will I receive the conferred letter after my phd thesis's corrections have been accepted by examiners?
I'm a UK phd student. I've heard from my supervisor that examiners have accepted the corrections of my phd thesis, which is really a piece of good news but still can't release my panic, because I need to get the conferred letter ASAP to prove to my employer. The deadline is mid-August.
I'd like to know how long after my phd thesis's corrections have been accepted by examiners I'll receive the conferred letter.

Seems like something to ask your advisor, letting them know your deadline in case something special needs to happen.

Unfortunately, this depends entirely on the university and inside the university on the speed with which messages are exchanged. You need to ask them instead of us. It might also be possible to negotiate with your employer who might be willing to accept a letter from your Ph.D. advisor as an interim solution.