Let's distinguish between papers and preprints, please. arXiv has contributed to a blurring of the distinction. The arXiv preprints are useful but should always be taken with a grain of salt. There is nearly no filtering done on things uploaded to arXiv.
Everyone accessing someone's uncritically reviewed work is a bittersweet gift.
In mathematics, at least, papers and preprints are indeed widely considered to be the same thing. In practice, for people working in the field, they are.
Math papers tend to be highly technical, read by other specialists in the field. When it comes for correctness -- whether or not I should take a paper with a grain of salt -- the authors' reputation counts for much more than the journal's. And in case of student authors, who are just beginning to publish, the advisor is implicitly staking their reputation on the work as well.
There are also preprints on the arXiv, written by people unknown in the community, claiming to prove the Riemann Hypothesis or some such. These aren't taken seriously by anyone.
An outsider might not be able to tell which preprints can be considered equivalent to papers, but such people are not likely to be seriously reading math research in the first place.
Yes. For example, here is a paper by some Cornell people where they reinvent machine learning model evaluation with the only motivation that I can tell is hubris and self service:
> Everyone accessing someone's uncritically reviewed work is a bittersweet gift.
Review work is not always done by senior researcher (e.g., professors). Senior researchers often hand this down to PhDs. Having 3 to 4 reviews by nice junior reviewers doesn't sound very critical.
Just to be clear: you'd expect PhD students to be trained in reviewing by their supervisors.
So PhD students writing the initial review is not weird - it is an expected part of their training. As is the supervisor going over the review and providing constructive feedback. As is the review being submitted under the supervisor's responsibility, with credits (mention in proceedings) to the student for acting as a subreviewer.
Yes, there are ways to abuse this system and yes, abuses do occur. Any system for gaining job prestige or workload reduction is a target for gaming. This doesn't mean the system should be thrashed, but it does warrant additions to curb excesses.
If a late-stage PhD student in the same narrow technical field can't review the paper, then it's almost certainly a problem with the paper. After all, junior people are the primary audience for any paper. Also, PhD students often have more depth on their research topic than the professors.
The sibling comments about making sure that most reviews are written by senior researchers also make good points. That should be checked by the program committee or editor.
They have to say they did this and you are forgetting the editor's role in paper evaluation. This criticism can and is taken into account and you can send papers out for more reviews if you get conflicting ones. In my experience as an editor, junior people typically give better reviews than senior (unless they are emeritus and then have unlimited time). I suppose this has to do with confidence in the junior person who will question their review themselves.
Arxiv paper quality is better than journals' average paper's quality. Because publishing in Arxiv doesn't count as paper in resume in many places, there are far fewer papers who publish just for resume.
Let's do a quick analogy. arxiv = github. It's all collaborative writing, right? You publish data, code, and your paper continuously. Then you have releases. Perhaps they get tagged with what publication venues accept them.
Depends on the field certainly. A paper in the Annals of Mathematics is definitely a lot more rock solid than whatever goes on the arXiv, or reviewed papers in certain fields that are particular magnets for junk science.
impendia|2 years ago
Math papers tend to be highly technical, read by other specialists in the field. When it comes for correctness -- whether or not I should take a paper with a grain of salt -- the authors' reputation counts for much more than the journal's. And in case of student authors, who are just beginning to publish, the advisor is implicitly staking their reputation on the work as well.
There are also preprints on the arXiv, written by people unknown in the community, claiming to prove the Riemann Hypothesis or some such. These aren't taken seriously by anyone.
An outsider might not be able to tell which preprints can be considered equivalent to papers, but such people are not likely to be seriously reading math research in the first place.
eru|2 years ago
The informal one you describe here, or any formal one you can come up with.
mnky9800n|2 years ago
https://browse.arxiv.org/pdf/2310.02335.pdf
Do not trust arxiv papers. They have not been vetted.
mo_42|2 years ago
Review work is not always done by senior researcher (e.g., professors). Senior researchers often hand this down to PhDs. Having 3 to 4 reviews by nice junior reviewers doesn't sound very critical.
Beldin|2 years ago
So PhD students writing the initial review is not weird - it is an expected part of their training. As is the supervisor going over the review and providing constructive feedback. As is the review being submitted under the supervisor's responsibility, with credits (mention in proceedings) to the student for acting as a subreviewer.
Yes, there are ways to abuse this system and yes, abuses do occur. Any system for gaining job prestige or workload reduction is a target for gaming. This doesn't mean the system should be thrashed, but it does warrant additions to curb excesses.
hedora|2 years ago
The sibling comments about making sure that most reviews are written by senior researchers also make good points. That should be checked by the program committee or editor.
mnky9800n|2 years ago
YetAnotherNick|2 years ago
adastra22|2 years ago
lallysingh|2 years ago
uxp8u61q|2 years ago
zarzavat|2 years ago
unknown|2 years ago
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