text:
Is it okay to upload code I wrote for replicating someone else’s simulation study?
I have code I wrote to replicate a simulation study by another author. Is it okay to publicly upload this in my code repository?
This will include:

code (my work, based on the author’s description in the study)
replicated table (values are similar to original)
original table (for comparison purposes, with citation)

You ask about uploading three different things, so it's worth answering with regard to the three parts.

Your own code: Definitely acceptable to upload it. You wrote
the code so
the code is your original work and you would own the copyright in
the code. The reasons for citing the original work in the context of
your own code would be two-fold: (a) to put your own code in context,
and (b) to acknowledge an academic debt to the original author. In
terms of copyright, however, I see no legal requirement to cite
the original paper.

Your table of results: Definitely acceptable to upload it. This is
your original work, however closely your results approximate the
original. The reasons for citation of the original work, in the
context of your table of results, are exactly as in point 1.

Original table, for comparison purposes, with citation: From the point
of view of academic ethics, this would look quite acceptable. However,
the copyright issue is less clear and will depend upon the jurisdiction
of the place where you are publishing, and possibly also, on the place
where the original work was published. The notion of "fair use" in
copyright works varies very substantially from jurisdiction to
jurisdiction.  If the original table (i.e., the other author's original
work) is more than a few lines long, I strongly recommend that you
seek permission to publish it. Just have a look at "permission
requests" on the website of the original journal.

Re copyright: Probably fine in the US under Feist v. Rural (human creativity is required for copyright to subsist in a work) and possibly Baker v. Selden (copyright cannot protect a system or method of organizing and performing arithmetic calculations). Problematic at best in Europe (incl. the UK) due to database rights. But you can do anything if you get permission from the rightsholder, as your answer says.

Regarding point 1: although there is no legal requirement to cite the original work, there is certainly an academic requirement. Not citing the original work would probably be plagiarism, which is quite a serious offense in academia.

I dont think you can copyright data or facts. The tables data is tables data, it has no copyright only the visual presentation may under some circumstance have copyright.

@joojaa Databases are protected in some countries, including in the EU, UK and Russia. It's not copyright, it's a separate intellectual property right (like patents and trademarks are other IP rights).

In some jurisdictions, the code itself, even if written from scratch, could run afoul of patents.

@jcaron sure but if it can fit in a publication its probably not a database, if on the otherhand it was dowloaded somewhere and has thousands of lines it may well be protected but then link to the source, done. EU has no software patents for computer programs.

also databases protection has in eu an  academic and noncommercial contexs exception as far as OP can demonstrate that its a public good its fine. Besides i mean if you published a table for all to see then offcourse said data in table can be used. thats the entire point of publishing something. However if you need to scrape the dats.

#3 would imply that exposing fraud in academic papers is legally impossible in some countries

Other answers here seem to focus on the issue of copyright.
I will add that it is also a good idea to publish your code and results in the interest of documenting replication of the original study. This is an important aspect of science, being able to replicate/reproduce the results of others, as it helps validate scientific findings.
In this context, I think it is also important to cite the original work to help document your replication of their work. Actually, you could even consider publishing your replication in a journal that focuses on this important aspect which is usually ignored by traditional journals in favour of new results. One such journal is Rescience C.

Publishing the code and results are clearly good ideas. Should you cite or quote the results of original study? I would say cite, and if the overlap needs to be explained then explain it, do not excessively quote it.

Yes, it is fine to do that as long as you acknowledge the original paper.

Basic copyright rule applies.  If you wrote the code yourself, then no problem.


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Are decision making processes for a tenure-track position totally transparent to all members of its search committee?
Assume a North American STEM-based tenure-track position to which a search committee, including a couple of faculty members and the chair of their department, corresponds.

Regarding decisions to be made at various stages such as "initial
shortlisting", "campus visit applicant selection", and "final
selection", are all the cited decision making processes for such a
tenure-track position totally transparent to all members of that
search committee? In other words, which scenario described below (or
otherwise) is the typical case?

Scenario 1:
Each member of the committee communicates their opinion about each applicant directly to the chair, and the other members do not know about the specific content of the assessment of other peers. Then, the chair, considering all the recommendations, solely selects the applicant who is the best in their estimation without expressing any justification to the remainder of committee members.
Scenario 2:
All members of the search committee can see each other's votes, and the chair shares their final justification to pick the lucky applicant(s) at every stage.

From my experience the committee discusses/debates the strengths/weaknesses/suitability of the candidates openly. There is not necessarily a vote if there is a general consensus on who the best candidate is. This approach has it's problems/biases. Hiring strategies almost always do.

@atom44: What do you mean by “hiring strategies”?

Just the process which is used by an organisation to hire staff. This can range from very formal and rigid to informal and anywhere in between. All have their advantages/disadvantages.

@atom44: but the question is exactly about such processes and what they are in view of the flow of communication between search committee members “in North America”.

Yes, that is why I didn't post an answer. This is just my (fairly limited) experience with academic hiring committees. I'm sure these things vary from institution to institution and even committee to committee.

Heavily depends on too many factors. No single answer possible.

Generally speaking I expect that decisions are transparent. If an organization operated otherwise it would lead to disfunction and poor internal working conditions. That happens, of course, but the pressure of faculty would tend to work against lack of transparency in most cases.
But heads of department may not be able to make the final decision in any case. A dean might also need to be in the loop, especially if there are financial considerations, for example.
And, you haven't covered the case where a hiring committee comes to some sense of consensus on a candidate (my experience) and makes a joint recommendation to the administration, rather than just individual (especially secret) votes. I have seen the situation where the hiring committee met as a group to discuss candidates and the senior members defer to a junior member to hire a person that would be helpful in extending her research. The hiring decision was then obvious to all.
Often there can be some compromise. A candidate might be viewed as fitting into some particular research group leading to some lobbying. A candidate might seem to bring something fresh to the department.
Heads of department and deans also, generally, want to keep peace in the faculty, especially when there are factions of various kinds. This might lead to some negotiations.
And if the person making the final decision, assuming it is so centralized, can't justify it to the faculty, then there is likely to be disruption. So, transparency is selected for if not always present.

A selection or hiring committee is not an ISO-specified machine, certified by an external evaluator. It is a collection of people with their own motivations and preconceptions, and as a consequence if you take 100 hiring committees, you will likely find 100 different approaches of which 60 are functional, 20 are dysfunctional, 10 employ unethical practices, and 10 involve nepotism and coercion. (Of course, the numbers are made up and you are free to choose your own numbers.)
The point to make is that you can't assume that there is a "typical" approach they all follow. I don't think the question as asked is even useful in assessing how these committees actually work.

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text:
Should I cite an encyclopedia or an article for a subject I don't know anything about?
In an article I am writing, I need to know the number of deaths in a certain war, in a period of time I am not very familiar with.
The information is in Britannica, so I wanted to cite it, but a friend of mine told me that I should never cite an encyclopedia and that it is not a source.
I have the impression that a research article only gives one author's point of view on the question, the result of their own work, and similarly for a review article, I have no idea of its quality, if the methodology is correct, etc.
What should I do?

Citing an encyclopedia would be OK. As you say, it might give more authoritative information or the general view of things compared to a journal paper.
However, Britannica on the web now seems to have articles written in a more casual way, and does not seem as authoritative as when all articles were written by world experts. I could be wrong, but this is how it seems to me.
So I think you need to find a few more proper sources and compare the numbers. If they disagree, you can say that estimates of the number range from x to y.

If you use something from the literature, then cite it. To fail to do so is plagiarism. But even if you "know the era" well, you should find a definitive source and cite it.
You can cite multiple sources if needed, when they disagree, for example. But this doesn't seem like a "point of view" issue in this case. You might choose the one that provides the most background on the topic, possibly the encyclopedia.
The problem with encyclopedias is that they can go out of date, so make sure that your citation included a date of publication or, for online resources, the date you accessed it. A specific reference to an item in the wayback machine is also possible for online references in many cases.
Note, however, that encyclopedias (even wikipedia) often have their own references to the source material from which the article was drawn. You may be able to find and cite those directly.

I fail to understand how you can answer "if you don't give a reference that's plagiarism" to a question of the form "should I cite X or Y?"

I read the question as "Should I cite (X or Y) or not?" This makes the answer "Yes, you should cite (X or Y)" make sense.

@JRN, "Do you like tea or coffee?". "Yes, yes I do!" But the truth of the matter is that I did misread the topline question, focusing on the body. Old eyes - I miss a few things. (And, for the record, twelve ingredient cocoa is my culturally appropriate beverage of choice.)

@Victor, updated. Sorry for the confusion.

I better understand why you were confused, anyway thanks for the update

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text:
Can postdoc offers be delayed a few months?
I am a PhD student in cybersecurity. I am close to finishing my PhD. I need to submit one paper to a journal and write one conference paper, then I am ready to write my thesis.
I got a postdoc position in a great research lab. The tentative start date is the beginning of May. They asked for a letter from my supervisor, stating that I am going to defend before the beginning of May. However, my supervisor keeps on telling me he can only state that I can submit my thesis before that date. He wrote a letter for that. I am worried that I may miss the opportunity because of my supervisor. I am not happy in the country in which I am doing my PhD. So, I want to get out of this country, too.
My question: can postdoc offers usually be delayed for a short time? Do they allow the student to start working after they submit their thesis even if they did not defend yet?

Can postdoc offers usually be delayed for a short time?

Maybe, maybe not.  It depends on several factors that may or may not be under the control of the research lab.  There is no general answer to this question, and a statistical answer, if it exists, will not help you.

Do they allow the student to start working after they submit their thesis even if they did not defend yet?

See above.
You will have to contact the research lab in question directly with this question.


text:
My supervisor is suggesting I will fail my PhD, is this possible?
I am a final-year PhD student in Canada studying cybersecurity. During my PhD, I did not have very good supervision. I told them I wanted to defend soon. However, one of my supervisors keeps on telling me: “Don’t rush, you may fail”.
I got one first-author paper in IEEE Transactions and 3 medium level first-author conferences accepted. How can I fail? Is it possible? Has anyone ever failed the PhD defense?

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

There are definitely fails in PhD defenses. It may depend on the specific system and I don't know about Canada, but I know of a number of them in the UK, where the candidate was asked to rework and come back in a year or so. Also PhD examiners in the UK don't have to accept a thesis just because there are publications. I do think some published material shouldn't have been accepted, and not everything I have seen published is in my view acceptable at PhD level.

I'd say that "major revisions" are not a fail necesarily. If you are told to work a bit more on it, yeah you fail as you don't get a PhD, but its not fail as "bye no PhD for you ever".

@AnderBiguri That's a fair enough objection to my use of terminology, however if you plan to apply/go for a postdoc or anything you need a PhD for directly after your defense, the immediate practical consequences are those of a fail.

Totally agree with that :)

yep, I remember an English student at Oxford who had published an entire book with Springer and was failed, which sounded like a real scandal to my ears. A friend of mine at Cambridge, was asked to completely rewrite his thesis, in Finance, spent a year doing it, sent the revision, did not hear from anyone for months, when he finally contacted them they said "Oh you passed last year". Nightmare.

My understanding was that ''fail'' means you have to do the viva again and re-submit the thesis.  If you get ''major corrections'', you technically have still passed the viva defence, as you don't have to re-do the defence.  Also, the difference between ''major'' and ''minor'' corrections is sometimes semantic.

@Tom There is some variation, also within the UK. I have seen both cases, where the viva had to be repeated, and where people were just told upon resubmission that they had passed now, even with major corrections. I don't remember exactly anymore but chances are I have even seen a form in which examiners could choose between these options (on top of minor corrections).

I can confirm that there are outright fails in the U.K. system.  There is usually a chance for making a major revision, but if the thesis (or viva) remains unsatisfactory then the candidate can indeed fail.  It isn't a pleasant experience for the candidate or the examiners, but quite often the supervisor has advised against submitting for a PhD and opting for an MPhil instead, which has lower requirements.

Your supervisor is aware of expectations for a PhD program. Their role is to help you understand these expectations and develop your PhD work to this standard.
Having one IEEE Trans publication and a few proceedings is good, but not necessarily indicative that your work meets the criteria of a PhD award. Normally, PhD dissertation is a major piece of academic research, which can be compared to a manuscript (a book). A journal paper is a more scoped contribution compared roughly to one chapter of your PhD thesis. Having one journal paper published does not guarantee you a PhD. I am aware of some candidates with 5+ journal publications, who failed their defence because they rushed and did not write an adequate PhD dissertation. It definitely happens.
Having a postdoc offer before you completed your PhD is a good sign that your work is interesting and promising. However, if your postdoc offer is conditional on you completing the PhD successfully, you still have to complete your PhD. Seeing your advisor as an obstacle is not constructive or helpful. Once again, they are trying to help you, and you should see their expertise as a resource.

Everything here is correct, but I'll just caution that 'your supervisor is aware of expectations for a PhD program' does not imply that supervisors have a 100% track record of being right when they predict a fail.

@DanielHatton True. But they hedged their bets: "you may fail" is always true.

This is mostly good but "they are trying to help you" is not always true.

Why PhD Defenses fail rarely
The main reason why PhD defenses fail rarely is that the process is structured so that in general people attempt their defense only when they are almost certain to pass. If there are any issues and objections, there is a strong preference to have them resolved before a defense, not have them be raised during a rejecting vote in the defense process. No one wants to waste all the formal process effort on a failed attempt, so supervisors and committees will know that someone is likely to fail and strongly advise them to not make the attempt and postpone it, so in general a failure should happen only if the student has been warned that they are likely to fail and disregards this advice to make the attempt anyway. This sounds suspiciously similar to what you are describing.

This answer could be seen as slightly misleading. OP is in a situation where they have been warned by the supervisor that they could fail the PhD if they submit with the current results. In that situation, the chances of actually failing the PhD are much higher than in the average case.

@lighthousekeeper that's exactly what the answer is saying‽

+1 for speaking to this specific case for the OP.
This is probably the most useful answer to pay attention to.   Maybe add some whitespace to guide readers?

Yes it is possible to fail a PhD defence and it does happen.  Thankfully this is rare.
I’m not in CS so I cannot compare with your peers but you should not make the error of thinking that you need so many publications to get a degree.
If anything, compare a situation where you have x publications as a single author with a situation where you have x publications with many co-authors.  Obviously your intellectual contribution to each publication matters; your supervisors and members of your PhD committee can decide you have not done enough even if you have 2x publications because your contribution to each publication has been minimal.  I want to emphasize I’m not talking about writing codes or some other such tasks: a PhD is a research degree so your advisor needs to convince your committee and eventually the external examiner that you have made significant and novel contributions to these publications.
I have heard of students failing at the defence stage.  This is not pleasant, and it’s a situation everyone wants to avoid.  It often (but not always) happens because the candidate is rushed by external events - some visa issue, some family matter, whatever.
In most systems I know, candidates will first go through a sort of “internal defence”, where the student may have to present their work to the committee, or there is some big committee meeting where the final draft of the thesis is evaluated before the thesis is sent to the external examiner.  Nobody wants the student to fail so having the committee on board minimizes but does not eliminate the risk of failures.  If the thesis is marginal and some committee members still have issue, but the thesis goes out anyways, there could be trouble at the defence with the external examiner.
If you think you have done enough but your advisor does not agree, it’s time to have a frank discussion with your supervisory committee to sort things out, and establish clear milestones for the completion of your degree.

The reason it is rare to fail a Ph.D. defense is that supervisors make sure nobody defends until they are ready. Don't push to be the exception.

Good answers already, but I think this might also be relevant.
Have you found your institution's academic regulations relating to research degrees? If not, you should. They might be a boring read but they should lay out the exact procedure and requirements for a PhD assessment as well as all the possible outcomes. There will be "failed" outcomes in the regulations. Sadly there will also be stories of students who have failed (even with publications). There might be resit opportunities, too. The regulations might also detail the appeals process if you do fail.
There is some debate in the comments here as to whether "major revisions" are considered a fail or not. The short answer is that depends on your institution's academic regulations.
One thing that the academic regulations are very unlikely to say is "1 good journal + 3 medium conferences = pass", so although your chances of passing are good, your chances of failing are unlikely to be zero.

From reading your other question, your supervisor isn't really saying that they think it's likely that you fail.

I need to submit one paper to a journal and write one conference paper, then I am ready to write my thesis.

I got a postdoc position in a great research lab. The tentative start date is the beginning of May. They asked for a letter from my supervisor, stating that I am going to defend before the beginning of May. However, my supervisor keeps on telling me he can only state that I can submit my thesis before that date. He wrote a letter for that.

Your current timeline has you starting, finishing, submitting, and defending your thesis in less than 4 months (really more like 3 months), with your defense being sometime in late April. Even if you and your supervisor do everything perfectly there are still a lot of outside factors that can impact that, the biggest one being when can/will your committee get together to hear your defense. Your timeline is so tight that if you submit your thesis and the committee takes a week to review it and then says we want some minor changes, we'll be able to review those changes in another week... What are you going to do? Or if one person can only meet on Wednesday and another person is unavailable on Wednesday so they have to schedule your defense for a week later? (Or two, or three...)
If you submit your thesis but don't have time to do the changes then it's possible that you could fail. It's even more likely that you don't fail but you don't pass your defense on your timeline. Your supervisor is (wisely) unwilling to commit to other people doing things that are outside of your control.

If your advisor says "it's time to get ready for your defense", your odds of passing are extremely high. If you try to defend against your advisor's will, that's a different story.
I would suggest you talk with your advisor about why they think you are not ready. It could be that they are not happy with your work and need more. It could be that they think you should take as much of the free study time you have in grad school and make the most of it: trust me, you will miss this aspect later in life!
If you believe you are being treated unfairly by your advisor in this situation, I would suggest you discuss with the chair.


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What is the socio-economic argument or historical basis for university professors and staff being paid by the state?
In ancient Greece, it was generally accepted that philosophers and teachers like Socrates did their work out of love of wisdom. If they were paid at all, it was by private parties and not by the state.
I personally never really understood the "Scandinavian" way of looking at education, namely that it is practically a job to be almost entirely subsidized by the state.
Is there any reasonable ground (through studies on cost to society, overall well-being of people etc) or any indisputable historical origins behind why state-subsidized salaries were introduced for higher education?
Related: What is the socio-economic argument or historical basis for university tuition fees?

How did ancient Greek philosophers and teachers like Socrates eat, if they weren't paid?

@AzorAhai-him- (1) You could be paid by private parties (as stated above)--this includes not just fees from rich patrons (Aristotle by Alexander) but also from more modestly endowed students/parents (as is still done today outside Scandinavia); (2) Payment by private parties could also include begging (Diogenes, also still done today to some small extent by e.g. Buddhist monks); (3) You could have been born rich (Plato).

Some Greek philosophers and teachers did not take money from their students.  Socrates and Diogenes famously did not, but Gorgias and Democritus may well have.  Moreover, the idea of taking money for teaching was clearly not alien to the Attic Greeks; Aristophanes shallow parody of Socrates in "The Clouds" has Socrates greedily taking money from pupils who he then largely fails to instruct.

This question is probably more suited to the politics SE rather than Academia. It is the same as asking any group of people why do you what you do etc.

(1) It's useful to have people around who are experts on things. (2) If you pay people to be experts on things, more people will become experts on things. (3) The state can pay many more people to be experts on things than private individuals can.

The theory on this I teach my students is public goods + a bit of club goods for things like city tax breaks (if you mean “the state” as all government support).

In fact, only part of salaries of public university employees comes from the state (and this varies greatly depending on the state and university). In some states, the percentage is so low, that "state" universities practically function as private ones. Other major sources are: Tuition, fundraising ("development"), grants. By the way, your question applies equally well to other educational institutions (elementary/middle/high schools).

"You could be paid by private parties -- this includes [...] also from more modestly endowed students/parents (as is still done today outside Scandinavia)" I don't understand what makes you believe that public funding for higher education were merely a Scandinavian thing.

As the question is asking about the "Scandinavian" model, I will try to provide an answer from a (central-)European focus.
During the Middle Ages universities, as we know them today, did not exist.
The universities from those times were often independent study and teaching associations without formal structure.
During the Renaissance, alternative research circles formed outside of the universities.
In the early modern age (Napoleonic and Victorian eras), many things changed.
For one, the idea of nation states emerged.
This meant that the administrative cadre was no longer simply nobles who fulfilled their duties to their overlords, but that there existed a state who employed people as administrators.
This coincided with the rise of a Burgeois class of administrators, who needed formal education to fulfill their duties. This led to state run primary and secondary eduction, but also to the establishment of "modern" universities. For example, France instituted universities (or "grande école") that educated their students in one particular topic (such as naval engineering or mine supervision). In Germany, for another example, the Prussian reforms after the defeat against Napoleon established a similar bourgeois body of administration instead of the absolutistic system. University were founded to guarantee proper eductation to the new administrative cadre.
These early universities were seen as necessity by the state to raise its own prospective administrators and were therefore largely subsidized or run by the state itself.
However, Humboldt developed a different vision.
Among other things, students at this university should have the freedom of study, rather than following a strict curriculum.
His ideas spread throughout Europe and even into the United States.
The modern European university system is therefore a remnat of these Humboldtian ideals.
The state no longer funds universities for creating their own administrative cadre, but to offer a comprehensive education for its well-informed citizen.
The question about the socio-economic benefits therefore becomes a bit moot, as the states run universities not because it is cheaper (or better) than private funding, but because it is seen as the duty of the state to provide this type of education.
Of course modern systems vary quiet widely between countries (even in Europe), so that of course there exist many nuances that I did not cover in this answer.

In the US, at least, and likely true elsewhere, some (not all) colleges and universities are funded primarily by State governments since it is recognized that an educated populace is a common good and contributes positively to the economy. Therefore tax revenue (which comes from the populace) is used to fund it. The Federal government tends to fund projects that might happen at universities, but not so much the universities per se.
I don't know if this was the first use, but when the US started to expand westward, the "land grant" program was used to create a system of universities that were primarily (in intent) to advance agriculture. Midwestern states in particular still have universities that devote a large part of their attention to agriculture. Cornell has such a division, as does Michigan State. But both of those, like the others have a wider mission support of which is related to economic ideas.
If the citizens know more they will, in principle, be more productive.
Possibly orthogonal to this is that in a democracy, there is a sense that an educated populace, even in such things as philosophy and other humanities, will lead to a more stable society. Government has a vested interest in stability as well as the economy.

If you go back far enough in history, the educated were also the wealthy. And if the social system required that all wealth be inherited by the first born son, then others in that social class needed something to do since they weren't "managing" the land. Some became educators: tutors. Some took up science. If pay was needed it would come from "patrons". But that system doesn't scale well.

The purpose of a system is what it does. If a system has been around for considerable time and nobody has changed it, then it must be concluded that they want it to do what it is doing. Or, at least, they don't dislike it enough to make the effort to change it.
What does the government funded university system do? That will tell you what the purpose is. Any claims about what it is intended to do that contradict this will need to be deprecated.
Over the period 2003 to 2023:

Tuition and fees at private National Universities have jumped 134%.
Out-of-state tuition and fees at public National Universities have risen 141%.
In-state tuition and fees at public National Universities have grown the most, increasing 175%.

Hmmm... Saving money does not seem to be in the list of purposes of government funding.
Why are universities becoming so expensive? The answer is clear: much larger number of administrators per student. A quote from that article:

“The interesting thing about the administrative bloat in higher education is, literally, nobody knows who all these people are or what they’re doing,” says Todd Zywicki, a law professor at George Mason University

But there is a reason for it, and there is somebody who knows. (Well... That is, he used to know. He has sadly died.) Jerry Pournelle told us what happens to bureaucracy when permitted to grow.

Pournelle's iron law of bureaucracy:
In any bureaucracy, the people devoted to the benefit of the bureaucracy itself always get in control and those dedicated to the goals that the bureaucracy is supposed to accomplish have less and less influence, and sometimes are eliminated entirely

Some universities have become indoctrination centers for various dogmas from left or right. Some have become places for CEOs and politicians to be "from." Some have become party schools where students go to destroy brain cells for four years.
But nearly all of them have become places to hire onto as administrators. Government funding protects them from competition and prevents them having to "clean house." And the administrators then wield the university's resources to protect their administrative activities.

-1 I don't see how this is supposed to answer the question: how does a strong increase of tuition fees and bureaucracy in US universities during the past 20 years give an explanation of why, in some other countries, professors or mainly paid by the state?


text:
I can not submit my paper again because the previous journal is not confirming the withdrawal request
I am in a desperate situation. Nine months ago, I submitted a manuscript to journal. In the first five months, the manuscript remained with the editor without being sent for a review. During that time, I sent an email to the editor urging him to find a reviewer soon, but it did not happen. Then I sent another email after two months stating that I will consider withdrawing my paper if the handling editor is not able to find reviewers. The status then immediately changed to "reviewers assigned", which made me really suspicious. Is my manuscript really under review or is the editor just trying to preclude me from withdrawing the manuscript?! I mean for five months he failed to find reviewers, then the status changed to under review after one day of sending my message about potential withdrawal, it was all suspicious. However, I neglected my suspicions and faithfully waited for a final decision from the handling editor. I waited three months, but nothing came from the editor. I sent an email to the editorial office asking about when the decision is expected to be taken and he said we will notify you as soon as we receive a letter from the reviewer. Another month passed and there was no progress in the review process (if there is any).
After roughly nine months of waiting, I really started to think the decision will never come. Therefore, I decided to withdraw my manuscript. In late December, I sent a message to the editorial office and the handling editor to inform them that I decided to withdraw my manuscript. The editorial office stopped replying to my messages ever since I started asking for a withdrawal. The handling editor never responded to any of my inquiries during this whole period. I contacted the publisher directly, so they can help me to solve this problem, and they promised to look into this matter. Two weeks passed but I did not receive any answer from them.
I could not wait any longer, so I sent my manuscript to another journal. The second journal rejected my paper because they found out that it is still under review in the first journal. Perhaps my mistake is that I did not explain the situation before sending the manuscript to the second journal. However, I sent them a letter explaining the situation after the rejection decision. the second journal did not answer me after all.
I am afraid that the same thing will happen if I sent my manuscript to a new journal, what should I do now? How I can solve this problem? I have no intention to carry on with the first journal because of their mistreatment.
Note: the editorial office of the first journal is not part of the editorial board. They are affiliated with the publisher to monitor the process, so they could be as uninformed as me about what is really going on with my manuscript.

Is the first journal reputable?

I do not think it is necessarily 'suspicious' that the status changed to 'under review' when you enquired - it is very possible that your enquiry prompted the editor to either (i) update the database to reflect action already taken, or (ii) to invite new reviewers who quickly accepted.

@Nobody The journal is good, it is indexed in Scopus and WOS' Emerging Sources Citation Index.

@avid What made me more suspicious is that the handling editor did not answer my inquiry about the expected time to receive the reviewers' report, but my main problem with him is that he never respond to any inquiry of any kind.

"s is that the handling editor did not answer my inquiry about the expected time to receive the reviewers' report",
This is unfortunately normal business in the publishing ... reviews are done pro-bono by researchers, so there is no guarantee on when they will deliver.
he never respond to any inquiry of any kind. "
Unfortunately it is quite normal behavior: the response is not direct, but indirect (see he rushed to find reviewer when you asked for cancelling the submission). The only way to talk with them is often ... to talk with them, i.e. reaching them by phone. which is difficult.

I would like to live in a world where publishing works differently. Unfortunately they can act that way, and still get away with a fat 40% profit margin. What you believe is unprofessional, it is unprofessional, and it is also the standard behavior of the professionals in that field. So they simply do not care about what we think or deem professional, and they keep working that way.
Yes, he shares the blame, he put you in this position, but he already showed he does not want to solve your problem, so you have to think how to get out profesionally from this problem on your own.

@EarlGrey Thank you, sir, this is really a learning experience for me, I will definitely consider what you said in my future submissions

I actually just encountered something similar from the other side (as the publisher), coincidentally enough.
When you submit to the third journal, tell them it is possible the manuscript is still being considered by the first journal, but you have (tried to) withdraw the manuscript there. Either include all correspondence you have with the first journal, or say you can provide the correspondence if desired. You can do this in the cover letter or, if there is no option to include a cover letter, by including a separate letter to the editor among your source files.
Your goal is to make it clear to the third journal that you are respecting publishing ethics and not trying to hide the possibility of a duplicate submission. The second journal presumably found out during the peer review process that your manuscript is simultaneously being considered by another journal, which reflects badly on you since by not reporting it, it seems like you tried to hide it. If you alert the third journal early, you should have nothing to worry about.

The fact that the second journal found out also suggests that the first journal was genuinely trying to get it reviewed. Presumably what happened is that Journal B invited a reviewer who said "I am already reviewing this paper for Journal A".

I have saved my withdrawal requests as screenshots, so I can send them to the new journal in case they asked

@EspeciallyLime I still think that the manuscript was not under review at least at the time when the status changed to reviewers assigned, the handling editor of the first journal did not answer me when asked about when the reviewers' reports are expected to be received

Actually, the second journal might respond to a similar explanation with evidence. It might be worth a chat with the editor. As long as you hold copyright, the paper is yours, not the first journal's. A request to withdraw isn't something that can be contested.

@Ameer that's quite possible of course, but it seems clear that at least they did assign reviewers at some point. I wouldn't normally expect the editor to say when reports are expected to be received, as I understand it is common for reviewers to miss deadlines. And certainly in my field 9 months is not an unusually long time to wait to hear back from a journal. I wouldn't bother to contact them until at least a year had elapsed.

@EspeciallyLime a year is really too long in my field of research, the optimal time ranges between 6 and 8 months, and it usually takes at most six months in the first round of review. That is why I was worried. In one of my previous experiences it took 10 months to do three rounds of review and my paper was published after all, I was really satisfied. Unlike the first journal in this case.

Perhaps my mistake is that I did not explain the situation before
sending the manuscript to the second journal. However, I sent them a
letter explaining the situation after the rejection decision. the
second journal did not answer me after all.

Absolutely a huge mistake, without any perhaps or maybe: you did not give a vital information. I would not be surprised if they put you in a kind of black-list of "authors trying to do everything to get published". After all, "to err is human. to forgive is divine" (Pope, 1711). There are predatory publishers, but there are predatory authors, too! No one serious wants to deal with such authors, since authors are abundant, the quick way is to cut off with someone showing these traits. Stop worrying, there are plenty of venues to submit your paper, plus the turnover in editors is quite rapid, so I guess in 3-4 years you can try to submit again to the 2nd journal ...
If you do the same thing with the third journal, it is highly likely that you will get the same outcome. "Errare humanum est, perseverare autem diabolicum" (2000 years ago, many people), which I liberally translate as "to err is human, to keep up with the same errors is stupid hellish".
Briefly explain to the 3rd journal the same facts you presented here, devoiding them of all personal evaluations. If you have to give some personal evaluations, just give them on your actions, such as not giving the second journals all the facts, but even there avoid any moral judgements.
If you want to be treated profesionally, treat the others and yourself profesionally.

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.


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How to get off the fence between 2 fields of study (math vs physics)?
For the longest time, as a university student, I have been hovering between my 2 favourite fields of study, namely physics and math. To distract myself from this dilemma, I wasted time completing courses in fields like economics. Frankly, no one needs a physicist or a mathematician with a sub-specialty in economics. So, I'll get some econ qualifications to make that time worthwhile, but now I need to face my bigger problem. Choosing one field of study over the other means closing off number 2. That's what scares me so much. I could do both math and physics, but then I feel I'd be wasting my time. The world doesn't need another jack of all trades know-it-all when all we need is competent specialists.
Help me please. Those who've figured out your career path in life, what was your aha moment and how did you find the courage to kiss all other topics of study goodbye? How did you know that this was the one and only thing you were meant to study on the planet? Thanks and hope this is a relevant question, as the physics stack exchange community re-directed me over here.

What career stage are you in? Just starting college, or about to finish?

A mathematician with an economy background is called a "quant", and they are very much in demand -- and make a lot of money.

I highly disagree with you upon this statement "Frankly, no one needs a physicist or a mathematician with a sub-specialty in economics."

this is like applied maths vs theoretical physics right? or theoretical maths vs theoretical physics? or what?

There are few suggestions (based on my own experience):

Compare yourself and other top students in your M-classes and P-classes: Are you head and shoulders above everybody else in one area and only one of many in the other? (Or something like this.)

Do you find that you have a "raw" intuition for physics problems (you "just see" the right answer without having a formal argument)? Ditto for math problems.

If you find that you really like formal proofs, where every single step is justified, your choice is likely to be math over physics. If you like working in a lab and like to see how "real" things are being built, then your choice is likely physics.

One more advice, if things are still unclear: Talk to some professors in your physics and math classes and see what they say.
And one last thing: Much of the research in mathematical physics requires you to know comparable amount of both. If you go and get a PhD in a physics department with a math physicist as your adviser, you will learn more physics than math; the reverse is true in you go to get PhD in a math department. However, in both cases, you will be taking classes in both departments.


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I feel like I didn't deserve to pass an exam
Recently I did my retake exam for Advanced Maths in college. Compared to the ordinary exam, it was easier. My grade was 9/10. I worked very hard for it, non-stop for 5 months, dealing with anxiety and depression.
However, instead of feeling happy and relieved I feel bad and guilty. I feel I didn't deserve to pass this subject via an easier exam, and that I should have taken the regular exam to prove that I was deserving to pass the subject. It's obvious that now I will never know.
Has anybody been through this? How to overcome this situation?

Perhaps it was easier because you worked hard on the subject for months. Tests are much easier if you really know the material.

This question might be of help.

The question is, do you understand the math and can you use the math in the tasks it's designed for in your life, career, or future studies? Exams are rough tools, mostly useful for sorting hundreds of people by a number, and have many points where the connection to your actual understanding can be arbitrary (choice of material, design of questions, human judgement in marking, writing time and environment...). Whether you do poorly or excellently on an exam is only roughly matched to your abstract understanding of the content, and almost totally unmatched to your ability to put it in practice.

If an objective observer would agree that the second exam you took was substantially easier than the first, then perhaps the conclusion should be that the first was too hard, not that the second was too easy.

"I should have taken the regular exam to prove that I was deserving to pass the subject." Prove to whom, and why? Deserving according to what criteria? I guarantee that there is not a single person in the world (besides you, apparently) who is interested in any kind of "proof" that johny36 is "deserving to pass the subject" according to some strange, unspecified criterion which is distinct from actually successfully passing the subject.

I don't want to make you feel more anxious than you already are, but feelings of personal inadequacy and a loss of self-worth are quite classical symptoms of depression (a condition you state you have suffered from). Please consult your mental health professional for help and support with this.

@JohnBollinger Given only two tests, you can't claim one was too hard or the other was too easy just because one was objectively easier than the other.

I never said you could, @chepner.  In fact, that's exactly my point.  The OP takes it to mean that that second exam was too easy, but that ignores the alternative conclusion that the first was too hard.  You don't know.  In fact, a third possibility -- and perhaps the best default position -- is that both exams were within an acceptable range of difficulty for the purpose.

Are you concerned that ethically you weren't judged the same way as others, or that pragmatically you haven't proved to yourself that you actually know the material? If the latter, you might ask yourself if you felt that you prepared adequately and thoroughly. Tests are just to prove/incentivize studying, after all. If the former, the question becomes whether the professor's standards are what matter to you or questions of fairness. If the professor has determined to their satisfaction that you know the material, is that enough for you?

Grades are not the goal, they're just signals on how well you did. It's utterly irrelevant that you got higher grades than what you would've gotten. What's important is you learnt well, as assessed by the instructor.

Forget about the exam and whether or not you're deserving, and instead, grab another book covering the same subject in more depth, or continuing to another,  more complex subject, read it and solve the practice questions in it. That way you're continuing on the path of self-improvement regardless of what your grade sheet says.

Congrats on your success! You deserve it.
Some people think that they do not deserve academic achievements because things are not as challenging as they expected, but they often forget what they have gone through in order to achieve that success. Sometimes, they also forget how hard it is to learn things.
Even if the exam was unreasonably easy or hard, you should move on. Do not dwell on the past. If you still think that you do not deserve the success, just work hard. Eventually, you will believe that you deserve every good thing that comes to your life.

"Eventually, you will believe that you deserve every good thing that comes to your life" - or not. But this is something to work on for sure :)

It is like moving up in the ranking because your opponent did not show up.  You may feel "I should have moved up by beating my opponent!  I moved up even though I did nothing!".  Maybe.  But you did move up, and now you have a new match scheduled against a different opponent.  However it happened, you passed Math and now have a new challenge coming up.  Prepare!   You are good at that now.

Just to reinforce Pikachu's excellent answer, here's a couple of things to keep in mind.

It is the responsibility of those who design and grade the exam to make sure it accurately tests the knowledge and skills it is intended to test. If you passed this test and somehow don't have that knowledge and skills, then those people screwed up. Since these people are experts in their field and in assessment of students, that is very unlikely. It's also not your problem.
There's no such thing as a "hard" test. It's always relative. Any test is "hard" if you approach it underprepared; an algebra test that you could do in your sleep would be an insurmountable challenge to the average twelve-year-old. And any test is "easy" if you approach it overprepared. If you work hard to prepare for a test and you find it easy, that means that your preparation was very successful, and you should feel proud of that.
Try and remind yourself that it is a well-known fact that we are generally lousy at assessing our own abilities. Sometimes we think we're much better than we are; more often, especially among academics, we think we're much worse. To get a better picture of your strengths and weaknesses, ask an expert who is in a position to assess you - an instructor you've worked with, for example.
The way you feel is important, even though it isn't based on facts. Don't try to shove it down or bottle it up. Talk over your feelings with someone you trust, like a close friend or a therapist. And take time for self-care.

I feel this link is also needed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

I would argue against point 2. There are plenty of poorly designed tests that intentional or not may include elements being tested that no reasonable preparation would've accommodated. I understand what you're getting at, but you're not talking about a universally relative situation in which the test is measured up against humanity. You're basically saying there is no such thing as difficult encryption. That its all relative and a any encryption is easy with a powerful enough computer. I mean, its a nice point that feels good, it just isn't true.

@DavidS I think you misunderstand my point. I absolutely am talking about a universally relative situation in which the test is measured up against humanity. My point is that just because OP found this test easy does not mean it would have been unreasonable for someone else (including OP's past self, the first time they took it) to find it very difficult. I make no claims about "reasonable preparation", because I don't think any of us is in a position to decide whether OP's preparation was "reasonable".

In one of my college math classes, the day after an exam, the professor had this quote already written in a small corner of the board at the beginning of class:

It is not Justice — the servant of men, but accident, hazard, Fortune
— the ally of patient Time — that holds an even and scrupulous
balance.
-Lord Jim

And we stared at it, off and on, during class.  Finally, at the end of class he made a few remarks about the exam, and ended by saying that if we were unhappy with our scores, we could be comforted by the words of Lord Jim.
I think the quote means that in human dealings, "fairness" is a concept both hard to define and hard to achieve.  There are just too many variables. But it evens out over time. Don't sweat the small stuff.  Luck may have given you an easy exam today.  Next semester, you may work just as hard on a subject and get an especially hard exam. That exam is just one part of your course grade, your course grade is just one part of your overall college rank for the semester and at graduation. And the importance of your college rank fades more and more as you get a job and get older.
You worked hard, you did the best you could, and you didn't cheat. Take the grade and move on.

I will add two perspectives to the already great answers above.
First of all, in my experience it is surprisingly tricky for instructors to create two equally challenging exams (in the sense that they are challenging for the same reasons and test the same skills to the same extent), assuming that the subject material is broad enough. It's pretty easy to create two very similar exams that test your multiplication skills, but not very easy for advanced math. It could be that the exam just touched on your strengths, and another student would've struggled with it.
Sometimes an exam may appear easy for student A because they remember a specific method for solving a specific problem, but the same question might seem impossible for student B who is not as comfortable with the method. For example, I had an exam question that was trivial to solve assuming that the students remembered a technique I covered in the course. Students who didn't remember this technique and tried to "brute force" a solution had the dubious pleasure of solving a 4-variable Lagrange optimization problem during the exam (instead of a trivial quadratic equation using the technique).
The second point I want to make is to remember why we go to college. There are two goals: one is to obtain a certificate that will make you more employable. The second is to learn stuff. If your feeling stems from the fact that you are not comfortable with the course material, that's fixable. Go over the material again, take another advanced math class that will deepen your understanding, or any other method you feel comfortable with.
In either case, you should absolutely not feel bad about passing an exam - this is a win, enjoy it!

Don't worry: you deserve your success! What you experience is classical Imposter Syndrome: "belief that you don’t deserve the achievements you have accomplished, is a common feeling among students". Also read this one on how to deal with it.

It is worth keeping in mind that in 10 years you will have forgotten about this incident. In case of anxious people - mostly because other incidents have filled the limited "anxiety box".
When passing my driving license, I was shown by the examinator (who was standing outside) to move faster away from one of the spots where I was supposed to back-park. The thing is that I did not even attempt to park, and he thought I was done.
I passed the exam and I was a fraud. A very, very happy fraud because I could have failed.
I had a math exam once when I said "... and then X happens". The prof misheard and said "OK, so now that Y happened, ...". My mind was spinning in a panic because I did not know if I was right with X, or if the answer was supposed to be Y and I got just lucky.
Turned out that I was lucky. A lucky and happy fraud, with his math exam in hand, ready to move ahead.

Has anybody been through this? How to overcome this situation?

Everyone goes through such cases. Some have impostor syndrome (mentioned in other answers), and some do not but it does not matter long term. You have another exam to get ready to pass.

I agree fully with the other answers that essentially just say "congratulations". They're correct.
However, what you're dealing with is likely a case of imposter syndrome. Fortunately for you, since you actually know where it stems from, there are some concrete steps you can take to address it.
If you're really concerned about whether or not you "deserved" to pass the exam, sit down with the "harder" paper (assuming you can get a copy) and see if you would have passed that too.
Assuming you do, your concerns can melt away. If you don't, well... I'd still argue you deserved to pass the exam because you passed the exam you sat, but you'll be in the same position you're in now.

I believe that deserving or not doesn't really express your thought exactly.
Let's look at this from the other point of view.
Expectations:
You have spend hard time preparing for your exam.

You were looking forward to a thorough exam, a difficult adventure, each step of which would remind you of how good you're prepared.
You were looking for something that made an objective assessment of your knowledge.
You were going for a "checkpoint" in your education which would be a proof to yourself that the time you've spent on learning is justified and you have indeed make a good progress in maths.

Reality
What did you get instead? An easy test, which doesn't require detailed answers and doesn't really say anything about your knowledge that you could be proud of. It's as learning how to drive a race car in tough conditions on a twisted road, and once it's time for an exam, be presented with just a straight to "check" your knowledge. Needless to say, that wouldn't check anything and wouldn't prove you're a good racer.
What conclusions can be drawn?

The fact that your college didn't bother with making a more objective test may say a lot: they probably don't care about students as much as you expected them to do, or this college is not a such a high-tier educational institution as you would thought it is and graduating high-quality masters is not something they are fighting for. This may sound too harsh, but be ready to get an unconcerned response once you ask your teacher for a more representative exam.

You should have a better understanding of why you're actually studying any particular field. A good mark is not a good goal; if everything you did want was a good mark, you should also ask yourself a question: is it worth it? A rating-based system (gamification) is a nice thing in education and it often works really well, stimulating students to "beat" each other in this game, but you should also look outside this game, you should have an expressible goal of your studying and realize why exactly you're spending time in this topic.

You've passed an exam, and did it with a good score. However, you're not really happy about it. You just suddenly realized that a good score is not a solid goal: you're not the only one who should be willing to get knowledge, but the teachers should also be concerned about teaching you. There's different ways of judging your knowledge in educational institutions. Ones just check that you know at least something and you're good to go, other do really care of the quality of educations. And both of them have their verdict expressed via a mark from 0 to 10, but only one of these marks is actually valuable - the one that was hard-earned in the college that actually wanted you to become great at this topic.
That said, I would suggest you to try working on any project that will utilize "the mighty powers" you've acquired while studying, it should greatly improve your overall satisfaction, reduce stress and the number of times you ask yourself "why am I even studying it at all"

What is the purpose of having a good grade? To demonstrate to someone that you are competent in a particular area. All anyone after this year is going to care about is whether or not ypu can actually do maths. You studied hard and are therefore pretty competent. You have a grade that suggests to people that you are pretty competent. Sounds like you're all good to me!


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Do universities look at the metadata of the recommendation letters?
My university did not have English letterheads. My professors asked me to go to the IT division and ask for one, so, I went and received an image of the letterhead, then I put the letterhead in a word document and sent it to my professors in order for them to write a letter of recommendation for me in it. They wrote in it and sent it to over 10 universities.
Now, I realized that the Word document that my professors sent their letters in has MY NAME as an author because I was the first one to create a word document. Even the ones that converted the Word document into a PDF also have my name as the author.
Are the university admissions committees going to go to the properties/metadata of the files and recognize this? I'm afraid they might think I wrote the whole letter, while I didn't!
I am so nervous right now, and I don't know what to do.

I've never looked at metadata... not only to avoid inadvertently "snooping", but also because it's mostly informationally worthless garbage: people "duplicate" other peoples' documents and edit-from-their, etc. Possibly "the Word Document" is one of the oldest living electronic documents, and is a single organism? :) :)

In the 1800s,  Mr. Akers owned a mill.  The road to his mill was called Akers' Mill Road.  When the city grew up,  the mill was replaced by residential flats.  Inside lived an academic job applicant.  A number of rejection letters were sent to Acres Mill Road and Aker's Mill Road, the address "corrected" by the rejecting institutions.

I may be mistaken, but I don't think it is uncommon (or at least unheard of) for people to write their own recommendations and have the "recommender" sign it as their own.

Probably most of my posters are created "by" one of our PhD students, because she was so kind to create a template.. the rest is probably by some guy called "local admin".

If they find out it probably won't worry them.  If it worries them, they will ask you.  If they ask you, give the above explanation.  I really don't think they will suspect you of any misdemeanour.

This is very unlikely. One normally only looks at the metadata if one already suspects fraud. And then, about half of the people in my department would not even know where to look for them. If I were to suspect something is fishy about your letter, I would first contact the letter writer to find out indirectly whether they wrote the letter. I would then either not act on my suspicion (if you would have written the letter, admission will be rescinded) or wait until I get some clarity. Finally, it is common to ask the people that ask for a letter of recommendation for technical help, so you are not the only one in this situation. In fact, I heard about professors that let the student write the letter and then signed it (or asked for changes).
Applying is very trying and people usually get very nervous about it, starting to fret about irrelevant details. I would like to tell you to stop doing that, but I doubt I or many in your position would be able to do that. In a couple of months, you will know.

You meant to write "to find out directly"?

I have supplied letters of recommendation to law schools. I usually have the person asking for it prepare the "rough draft", then I'll edit as much as I think necessary before sending. The metadata would usually show someone other than me as the original author.

TL;DR Hanlon's Razor - never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity
No, I don't think you (or your document or the meta data) is stupid. Rather, this is an example of something where the plain explanation (you helped get the letterhead) actually makes more sense than you writing your own recommendation letters.
The Word (and similar applications) meta data is a bit wacky and unreliable. In addition to your situation (you created a blank and sent it to someone else who wrote the real text), there are similar problems if a computer changes ownership (existing documents continue to show old meta data unless explicitly changed, even though new documents show new meta data), if one persons sets up documents for a group, etc. The meta data often has "junk" info if the computer was set up generically and then handed to a user (username = user, password = password1, etc.) And on top of all of that, I think the average user has no idea the meta data even exists!
I was once involved in a situation with some legal documents that showed something like 3am as the edit time. I am fairly well convinced (this was before most computers used automatic internet time setting) that it was not foul play in the middle of the night but rather an AM/PM problem when setting the clock on the computer.

Totally unrelated to Academia: If you fly to another time zone, and your phone or computer doesn't display the right time, please please please change the timezone, and not the time. That avoids most AM/PM problems. Or you might be in London and look at a legal document that was modified at lunchtime in Los Angeles, and shows 10pm GMT.

Put yourself in the shoes of the members of an admissions committee. You have to go through hundreds of applications, and your time is limited. And, above that, you still have your routine work to do -- research, teaching, grading, writing grant proposals. Will you have time or desire to investigate the metadata of the documents? Of course, you won't -- unless you come across something totally bizarre and abnormal (in which case you will first get in touch with the recommenders). So please calm down. The chances of this happening are asymptotically approaching zero.  Good luck with your applications!


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How to get my motivation levels back up when I'm approaching burnout?
How could I get my motivation levels back up as a student?
I'm in physics/ astrophysics with other minors. I love physics so much, so I don't need anyone to ask me whether this is the right choice of majors etc. I've already tried changing majors a few times in the past, but I always wind up crawling back to physics. So, this is what I need to pursue.
I'm in my upper yrs. I had some setbacks due to an auto accident, so my grades went from mostly a's to mostly f's and now I'm back up to mostly a's (hopefully, at least). I did probably fail an introductory biology class last night, which left me crying for a few hours. Biology, the bane of my existence. I just need to take the course to complete my degree program, so I'll have to re-take it. And then I stayed up till midnight last night finishing-up my math homework. I get to school with a sense of coldness in my spine because I was very sick and missed a class, which meant missing a test. I emailed my prof about it and he said that I was fine because the worst test score would be dropped. It's all work-work-work as a student in this program. It's effing lonely work too because I don't really have friends as one of the only girls in the class. My friends are from outside of school. My hobbies are in other areas, and they're usually left neglected during crunch time.
It's just hard to keep the motivation levels up sometimes when it feels like the homework, the tests, and the studying never stop. If I ever have a minute to breathe, I don't, because I know that I'll later wind up pulling an all-nighter when I fall behind in a course and I don't know the content well enough to just waltz into the exam centre the next day.
Help please? I'm not sleeping through my classes or this close dropping out or anything. I'm just this close to burnout and trying to know how to do better. Thx.

Are you a high school student or a university undergraduate student? US undergrad seems to use terms that can sound like high school to people from elsewhere

This is an issue worth a consultation with a professional. Or perhaps two different professionals.
For more effective use of your time, an academic counsellor might help give you hints about process.
But for the burnout and general feelings you should speak with a mental health professional to see what is behind it and how to overcome it.
Cramming for exams doesn't help either of these.
Most (larger) universities will have one or more offices in which you can seek help on these issues. They exist because your issues are shared with others.

Assuming you are from undergrad (though this answer is probably applicable to anyone anywhere), the most obvious thing is that it sounds like your main problem is that you're working too much.
What's worth understanding is that burnout (and depression) has a biological profile not of nothing happening, but too much is happening. Your mind and body is pushed to its limit and things are starting to break down because of this, so trying to just push yourself through it probably won't work.
A couple of things that are worth keeping in mind:

Perfection is the enemy of good enough. If you reached a point where the stress and strain of trying to produce perfect work ask yourself, do you need to be perfect, or just good enough. Can you let your work slip so you have extra effort that you can invest into keeping yourself healthy and strong or to develop better coping mechanisms/support networks. After improving yourself in these ways then you can ask, should I push for perfection again.

Schedule time to relax. If you don't naturally schedule time in your week to relax and are just work-work-work, change your priorities. Life-work balance (notice I swapped the order ;) ) is not just some ideal of the average person but a way to keep your body functioning. If you feel guilt at taking time off change your frame of mind and think about this as maintenance for the flesh suit you spend all your time driving around. Keeping your biochemistry in balance is almost as important as making sure you get enough carbohydrates as fuel. This also means scheduling time to make sure you are healthy and let yourself relax when sick.

Don't forget friends. We are social creatures, human interactions can help us to relieve stress. Try to make sure you have time to catch up with your old friends, or try to find new friends even though you're the only girl, you said you keep coming back to physics, that's probably something you share with a number of people in the class, a good basis upon which to build new friendships and with whom you can share your particular interest.

Change your frame of mind. One thing that can trigger burnouts is if you have too many things where you say "I have to do X" or "I need to do X" rather than "I want to do X". You said biology is the bane of your existence and that you need to do this for your degree. Is there something about biology you could find interesting, even if its not as interesting for you as physics and astrophysics. If you could find that aspect then you might start to be excited to do biology homework/revision, even if you prefer to do physics homework first (or leave it until last as a treat for completing the biology homework). If you struggle to see that, maybe look at "evo-devo" or "molecular shape of you" which cover biology at that level biased towards a physics perspective (the artist got a master's degree in high energy theoretical physics, so I've noticed they are slightly biased towards the way a physicist will approach a problem)

Keep in mind I'm not a professional and this is therefore only friendly advice from the internet. And as Buffy said in his answer there are professionals you can reach out to about this who may be able to give better answers then me. Especially if this actually is coming about from some biochemical or neurological differences/atypicalities where "just do X" amounts to no more than wishful thinking.


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How come old people (60+) still are contributing to top papers in journals like Nature?
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04877-w
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Lander
Eric Lander is 65 years old and he was Science Advisor to the President and was Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy and yet he published a top article in Nature. How is this still possible to be in the leading edge of research at 65 years old? Is there something I am misunderstanding?
A researcher who doesn't work full-time and does other thing shouldn't be expected to do high-quality research, especially after he switched to a management position.

"Is there something I am misunderstanding?" It's impossible to tell, since you don't tell us why you believe that researchers at the age of 65 should not be expected to do excellent research.

I mean, 40+ years of experience can't possibly count for anything... I have a staff member significantly older than 65 who continues to produce and publish good work. I've known and worked with many more, and am getting closer to that than I'd like to admit. Frankly, the question is insulting.

It would probably be wise to have a look at the authors contributions. He wasn't particularly doing the everyday lab and data duties...

Consider reading this answer to a similar Mathoverflow question.

@Mark How do you check the contributions and also why is he named last?

@Sayaman you can find them in the "Author information" section (or other places for other journals, but nowadays, contributions are often listed)

He is not named last on this paper - if you're not looking closely enough to notice something like that, why should anyone here take you seriously?

Contrary to rumor, scientists who move into technical management are not given a lobotomy. Instead they now have to grok a broader set of research areas and make connections across more areas.

Finally, I have an irrefutable excuse for not doing any decent research! I thought I was only going to be old at 99.

To publish high quality papers, you need a good team, with lots of experience in the topic and in writing papers.
Experience in general is somehow correlated with age, specially for experts in most fields, and particularly for academics (not 100% of course).
In my experience, people overall become better at writing papers with experience and age.
So then there is no reason to discount contributions from senior or even close to retirement academics, they have a lot of accumulated experience, so it should be the other way as you are implying.
Also consider that people that are passionate for science and research are very likely to want to do this literally until the moment they pass away. Personally I really like writing research and its something I would like to do for life.

I noticed a couple of down-votes.
I truly understand the down-voters.
Still, I, personally, think that's a very important question (even though, I do admit, rather irritating).
Recently, I have heard several conversations at my department between the younger colleagues focusing on their inability to understand why the older professors do not retire.
That was a great surprise to me, because I, personally, had noticed the older scientists were the major contributors to the science. I thought that was natural because of their experience.
Though, my younger colleagues didn't seem to think so.
Here's my explanation why it happens.
In my life, I have encountered several professors in what can be called their old ages who were the most knowledgeable people at their respective departments, produced the biggest amount of new ideas at their respective departments and led the most groundbreaking works at their respective departments. Their minds were absolutely sharp, their colleagues would constantly go to them for advice.
And I assumed 2 things.
First, brain - as oppose to the rest of the organs - can get better with age if you keep it trained.
Second, if you are doing science not because you want your salary but because that's the way you live that brings you to harmony with yourself and somehow affects the biochemistry of the brain preventing it from aging.
I'm not going to list all the names of the scientists, I'm talking about for the sake of anonymity. I can only given an example of two scientists who are known publicly.
First is Roger Penrose. He is in his ninetieth. He is full of new ideas. His thinking is clear. His experience is unmatched. At some point, there was even an institute dedicated to the exploration of his ideas!
Second is - to a lesser extent - Leonard Susskind. His thinking is clear and he keeps generating new ideas.
Again, that's not a controversy. That is an absolutely logical consequence of, first, science being your life, second, vast experience. Your body can get tired, but your brain doesn't care about that and keeps generating new ideas as long as you're happy.
And here's why I think the original question is important.
I know that UK universities have a policy that professors should retire at a tender age of 60 or something. There are cases in the US where professors are given to understand that they should start thinking about retirement due to their age.
But, in the light of what I've written above, I think that's wrong. The professors - who want to keep working - should be given everything they want to keep working. They are the greatest treasure of a nation. Their experiences and their potentials to contribute to science are invaluable.
Asking a professor to retire is the worst thing a university can do.
P.S. I understand this answer might be considered an opinion-based. And I will understand if the moderators delete it. Still, I decided to post it because I wasn't allowed to add a comment due to low AcademiaSE score, but I thought the question could lead to an important discussion.

-1 No offence intended - but jumping from "encounter[ing] several professors" to neurophysiological conclusions ("the brain [,,,] can get better with age if you keep it trained", "somehow affects the biochemistry of the brain preventing it from aging") is unlikely to lead anywhere.

@JochenGlueck, ok, I agree, I'm being too loose here using the word "concluded" as if I did a rigorous statistical analysis. I should've used the word "assumed" or "suggested". I'll go ahead and edit that. Still, I am not rejecting my assumption. Like I said, I do see that the answer is opinion based and it can be deleted by the moderators.

I would agree with the sentiment - in fact, I've made a very similar argument (people past the retirement age should be allowed to work) recently elsewhere on SE, but you are speculating quite a lot there. There is a world of difference between "some people in academia stay sharp well into the old age, and their experience even gives them an advantage" and "on average, academics stay sharper than the general population because they are flexing their brains more". It may well be a subject to selection bias - do all of them stay sharper or only those who keep working and whom you do observe?

So while I think your perspective is valuable, I have to agree with @JochenGlueck - your answer does not fit the "authoritative source" format very well.

Not everyone can continue to produce good scholarly work into their 70's and beyond but some can. The range of human ability and experience is extremely broad. The fact that you occasionally find people several sigmas beyond the mean is to be expected. Any large population has outliers if it has variability. That's just statistics.
The same is true in other fields as well. Music, perhaps, and art.
Some people are actually more productive as oldsters than as youngsters, perhaps due to opportunity and a developing circle of collaborators (my case). Others work in obscurity on hard problems that only mature in their later years.
One of the reasons that some of us old folks don't continue to produce, in fact, is change of interest, not loss of ability.
And, it isn't something that can be especially well predicted for any individual. We are also fragile beings as well as being intelligent ones. A severe concussion or stroke can end a promising career as can several diseases that affect blood flow to the brain. Heart disease and diabetes among them.
And, 65 isn't especially old these days in any case, given modern medicine and technology.


text:
Grant number and acknowledgment
I submitted a paper to a journal a few months ago and applied for a research grant one year ago. Currently, my grant application has not yet been awarded, but I anticipate that it will be granted in approximately two months. The exact date, however, is unknown.
I intend to include my grant number in the acknowledgments section of my paper, as per the grant policy. However, my grant number is currently not available as my application is still in progress. Last week, I received a report from the journal indicating that only minor revisions are required and I have one month to submit my revisions.
Question 1: What should I do if my paper is accepted before I receive my grant number?
Question 2: Is it possible to ask the journal to add my grant number after the online version of my paper is published?
My questions may appear illogical or unethical, but let me explain how grants work in my location.
Applying for a grant is like playing a game. Once your grant application is successfully awarded, you are given a specific time period, often 1 or 2 years, to "finalize" it. If you cannot finalize your awarded grant within this time frame, you will not receive any funding.
To finalize a research grant, you must acknowledge the grant with a grant number in your published papers. The number of papers and the time frame in which they must be published are specified in the grant policy. If you cannot meet these requirements, you will not receive any financial support and will likely have a negative reputation in the academic community.
So I am following the rules and trying to meet them. If I were a very smart person who could produce many papers in the future, I wouldn't be worried about this matter.

Please limit your inquiry to one question at a time

You need to explain why you think that a grant that hasn't been awarded has contributed to the paper and thus requires acknowledgement. Otherwise this makes no sense.

@Sursula I don't think these two questions are different enough that it would be better in two posts.

Ok: Did you receive a temporary award number from the funding agency when you applied for a grant? (NSF does it.) Did you look in the literature in your field to find out how did acknowledgements were phrased in papers published during such a time period? Did you contact the agency to find out how to deal with this problem? Did you look for online instructions?

Can you link to your funder's terms and conditions which lay out the rule described in your edit? Those conditions seem exceptionally unusual, and as others have noted seem quite against normal standards for the acknowledgement of grants.

You're basically asking how to cheat the system. It's no surprise that you aren't getting any help.

Is my understanding correct that in the system you describe one does not get any money whatsoever before they have a finished project? If not, when do they get their first funds de jure? (note de jure here, it is of utmost importance! In some bureaucracies, the difference between de jure and de facto allocation may be over half an year)

What you are describing is not a grant but a form of contract, where you receive payment at the end of the contract against deliverable.  Honestly, something’s not right as you have explained things: if they are as you suggest, then it is incumbent on the organization awarding the grant to give you the “grant number”, as this number is required for completion of the “grant”.

The simplest solution in this case is to contact the funding agency and ask them directly how to proceed as you do not have this grant number.

I must admit I’ve never seen this setup.  A contract may have milestones to reach before the next tranche of funding is released, but someone (either the grantor or the institution) would give you some reference number so that invoices related to expenses to be recovered during the course of research can be claimed with suitable supporting documentation.

You list grant numbers in the acknowledgments because the grant supported the work presented in the paper. But since you have not been awarded the grant, it cannot have supported the work in question. Consequently, you should not list the grant in the paper.

I think the judgement on this depends very much on the grant policy (and essentially where you live). I just want to find a solution for my situation.

@FieldAussie: If you think your funding agency (which you did not name) is this unusual, then contact them directly.

@FieldAussie You might want to consider that you are in fact mistaken about your situation. Since it is clearly impossible the acknowledge a grant number before it has been assigned (unless your grant is about time travel), it clearly cannot be the grant policy that you do so.

I am fairly certain that you misunderstand the grant policy, as others have already mentioned. If you understood it correctly, how far back would you want to go to correct papers for grants you received years later?

@WolfgangBangerth "I would like to acknowledge grant #XXXX-XX-XXXXXX, which I received 30 years ago. It has set me on the research path I have been following since. Its importance for this paper could not be overstated, as the research presented here would not be possible without that invaluable support."

@Lodinn no, you misread that. It would be the other way around: I would like to thank any grant I might ever get, without that invaluable support I will not have been able to have written this paper.

@DonQuiKong Right, my bad. I got carried away a little by the correction bit, but your edition is succinct. Thank you.

You should not acknowledge support from a grant for work done prior to the awarding of said grant, irrespective of the date you applied for the grant. The policy of all grants I know applies only for work done during a period covered by the grant.
In your situation it would be incorrect to put a grant number in your revised paper.

Yes, but it is always safer to put in relevant papers that come out at the beginning of the grant.

One possibility is to ask the journal for more time to submit the revisions (which they are likely to agree to since they probably have plenty of papers happy to have their publication dates bumped up slightly earlier). Then, if your grant application is accepted and you start receiving grant money while you are still working on the revisions, then the grant is supporting the paper and it is acceptable to acknowlege the grant in the revised paper.
I don't know if this is really a great choice, but it seems like an ethical choice to me (presumably you have plenty of other work you can be doing while you're waiting to do the revisions).
It's certainly not ethical (as others have pointed out) to list a grant that you haven't received or that didn't contribute to the paper; and the journal won't change any published version after it's published (that would be unethical on their part).


text:
Is this Stanford certificate real?
A Christian pastor claims to be a Stanford professor who holds three PhDs in comparative theology, history, and eschatology.
However, his profile is not anywhere on the university website or anywhere in Google (rather than in his YouTube channel). However, he started a theological seminary and claims to be affiliated with Stanford University.
Below there is the certificate given in his seminary. I am more skeptical about this because the logo used below is the Stanford Medicine logo. I don't know why they used the medicine logo in a theology certificate. And on the official Stanford website, they don't mention a Department of Philosophy in Religious Studies.
Is this an authentic or fake one?

Update
I e-mailed Stanford about this and they confirmed that this is a fake one:

No, Stanford does not have a department of philosophy in religious studies and we don’t offer a degree in Bible ministry.

Please don’t write answers in comments. It bypasses our quality measures by not having voting (both up and down) available on comments, as well as having other problems detailed on meta. Comments are for clarifying and improving the question; please don’t use them for other purposes.

As a sidenote: Be wary of of somebody who flaunts three PhDs, irrespective of their certificates. It’s like having three driver’s licenses (for the standard car). The standard academic career path requires one PhD. Two PhDs are reasonable in exceptional circumstances. Three only appear in fiction. Now, I acknowledge that this is supposed to be a honorary degree, of which you can indeed accumulate more, but then you usually have something better to flaunt like your Nobel prize.

I see several red flags.

On Stanford's website, there is a Department of Philosophy and a Department of Religious Studies. There is no "Department of Philosophy in Religious Studies". Even if there was a combined department in the past, it should be an "and" and not "in".
There is no date saying when the honorary degree was awarded
A typo on the word 'title' incorrectly spelled as 'titile'

Comments have been moved to chat; please do not continue the discussion here. Before posting a comment below this one, please review the purposes of comments. Comments that do not request clarification or suggest improvements usually belong as an answer, on [meta], or in [chat]. Comments continuing discussion may be removed.

We get it - y'all have lots of other examples to add in the comments of all the typos you've found. Edit them into the answer if you want, or make your own comprehensive answer.

Hey, I have a typo on my undergraduate degree (the year it was granted has only 3 digits).  I've never had it corrected.  It's a somewhat less than once a decade conversation starter.  Very few people notice.  Once, an immigration officer looked at it and said "Hey, you are even older than me"

Is this an authentic or fake one?

It  looks highly suspect, as @NebUzer and @ZeroTheHero explain, so it's probably inauthentic. But  - you can always just Ask Stanford. Here is a page of their program in philosophy and bible studies, or you could just go up to the department of philosophy. Write their secretariat or general contact address and inquire about this degree.
Another option is Stanford's  "Cerificates and Verifications" service. While that's student-oriented, they might still be willing to help.

Adding to red flags raised by others:

This degree was granted to someone currently 35 years old. This is very young to get such a degree “honoris causa”, which is a kind of lifetime achievement award.  I suppose it is possible to get such a degree by making a significant donation, or by being truly brilliant, but in all circumstances I know the university will put up some sort of public elogium when the degree is awarded.
My own degree does not give my date of birth but does indicate the precise date on which the degree was awarded: this is missing from the image.

Yes, I've never seen degrees with birthdates before.

Also, according to https://studentservices.stanford.edu/more-resources/student-policies/graduation/graduate-degrees-degree-conferral, 'Stanford University awards no honorary degrees'.

It might be a country-dependent thing (and thus still a red flag in this context), but in Germany all degree certificates I have seen explicitly mention date and place of birth. My guess is that this is the traditional bureaucratic way of distinguishing between different people with the same name.

Note that your first two sentences already show that this person is not who they claim to be. All professors at a proper university have a website that can be found through the university/ department website. It might not say much beyond the name and department of the university but every department will list every single professor. So if you can't find their website on the Stanford university pages there are not a professor at Stanford.
Additionally having three PhDs is highly suspicious. It is common trope in fiction to have brilliant scientists with PhD in multiple fields but this almost never happens in practice. There certainly are brilliant people who have done signficiant scientific work in multiple fields but they don't hold multiple PhDs (there are multiple questions on this site from people asking about doing a second PhD, the universal answer is: don't do it). The only real exception is honorary PhD titles, people can and do hold multiple of these but when these are mentioned they are always referred to as honorary, leaving that word out would be academic dishonesty.

Actually I knew someone with 3 PhDs (also a priest) and I have no reason to suspect the degrees were fraudulent.  The expectations for PhDs have certainly evolved over time: PhD theses in physics used to rarely longer than 40 pages until the late 60s.    Honestly unless have an usual lifestyle with limited obligations it is hard to see how one can find the time,but it is not unheard of.
I also knew someone with three undergraduate degrees for that matter.

@ZeroTheHero I think the biggest issue with multiple PhDs is the main goal of a PhD is to learn to do academic research.  Once you've attained that "certification" the skills will be directly transferable to another domain you have deep and/or overlapping expertise in without having to go through the process again.

@Chuu yes indeed. Not to belittle the achievements of someone with 3 PhDs but I do observe that the degrees were in cognate fields and I'm aware that this person was required to do "only" a year of course preparation before launching into his next PhD.   Nevertheless I simply would not have had the stamina for this...

It's a fake, top to bottom.  Stanford does not confer honorary degrees, and this policy has been in place since at least the 2000-2001 academic year.

As several folk have already pointed out, people with 3 PhDs are rare; so are professors at Stanford with no publications to their credit. Maybe you could use Google Scholar to check to see whether Doctor Schmoctor has ever published anything.