Physics How to close the gap: From Independent Research to Academic Discourse

[Dale]

The better way is getting a DOI on another place, where no wannabe-peer-review-gatekeepers misuse their power

First, that is assuming that rejecting a specific paper is a misuse of their power rather than the intended and proper use of their power. They should reject poor papers. In fact, too high of an acceptance rate is a hallmark of predatory publishers.

Most professional scientific journals send papers to two peer reviewers, and in the event of a disagreement they send it to a third. So, if you had a “misuse” reviewer (meaning that they reject an otherwise excellent paper) then all that would happen is a delay while the paper is sent to the third reviewer. If, on the other hand, a paper is rather mediocre, then tepid support or mild disapproval from the appropriate reviewer, combined with the rejection of the “misuse” reviewer might lead to a rejection, but will lead to useful feedback to improve the paper. Individuals misusing their power will only delay a paper.

Second, please be aware that for the purposes of PF, having a DOI does not mean that a work is considered part of the professional scientific literature.

My paper 10 pages, 6 of em derivations, took 11 minutes to be denied, which shows, that they even not looked at it in detail.

Or it may show that the problems with the paper are so obvious that no more than 10 min was required. Again, you do not know that this specific rejection is a misuse of power.

Because you are basing your work on the foundational literature, chances are exceptionally high that your idea is not novel. If so, then people who are actually aware of the modern literature can point to a paper you have ignored where it has already been investigated. In such a case, a quick rejection is entirely appropriate.

When I was in grad school after about 1000 hours studying the literature I would start to come up with what I thought were new ideas. I would go to my advisor, pitch my new idea, and he would turn around to this huge set of filing cabinets, and pull out a paper from the 60’s or 70’s where my new idea was already investigated. I would go back and study for another 100-200 hours or so and repeat the process with the same result. This continued until about 3000 hours of study when I finally had my first actual novel idea.

The point is that it is exceptionally difficult to have a novel idea. You simply cannot do it without literally thousands of hours of study of the modern literature. It is not a misuse of power to quickly reject papers that are not novel. You are focused on the 10 minutes, but what it actually probably took was closer to 30000 hours of preparation plus the 10 minutes.

 

[Esim Can]

I would agree, if not two professors, who know the work and seen it would not agree on my view. One has even said, that it will be denied probably, because they don't like such ideas, no matter if the math is correct or not. And you forget, that arXiv is not a peer-review but a simple preprint server, who should actually only do their job and leave it up to the community to decide. And what about the other papers they denied? Even deny a paper, after being peer reviewed by a journal? And this is not one case. Yes, you could say, that my paper was nonsense, and who cares, well perhaps it is. But a preprint-server denying the publish after peer-review. This is ridiculous. It is not worth the time to argue about arXiv.

 

[Dale]

And you forget, that arXiv is not a peer-review but a simple preprint server

Yes, that is a good point. I have only experience with peer review publications. I have never put anything on arxiv, and I always check the publication information for papers that I read there.

That said, if a paper came to me for actual peer review with no modern references, I would reject it quickly. And that would not be a misuse of my power. But the journals that I peer review for would probably not send me such a paper in the first place. And that would also not be a misuse of their power.

Arxiv may be different in that regards. I don’t know their posted policies. But in my opinion the rapid rejection of a paper that ignores the modern literature is not a sound basis to claim “wannabe-peer-review-gatekeepers misuse their power”.

 

[Esim Can]

@Dale
I appreciate your constructive suggestions. Perhaps we work a bit on a different field. I remember, that you work at medical physics? If true, there things are different and like you said, you are very right. In that field you need 50 or more references, because you build up on modern work, you go the next step. My denied paper had 9 references i think and the most recent is 1996. And believe me, i searched everything, which could only be near to that what i try to do. Because in many points i had difficulties to formulate it, and needed the work of others, who went a similar way. I wish i found some, but no. There were and are none. Shall i put all the failed attempts in there saying how they tried it, why it did not worked out, or the other ones tried it, did not worked because of the violation of that principle and so on. If some works on a foundational level and if it is really novel than there are no others doing it, otherwise it would not be novel, isn't it? So how on earth could i put references into it, if there are none? I work by the way 40 years on physics, and this is the FIRST novelty (if it is correct). I understand your valid point totally i think.

In peer-review, you get an answer and a reason, why your work is rejected. That is the point.. That i can accept and expect it. At least some transparency why is a sign of respect of the work put into these things. But this gate-keeping mentality of a preprint server, which once was made to make science more open and accessible, now acting like a VIP-Club,.. really now?

No problem then. I have put it on CERN-Server and have a DOI, so who cares. In future, i will try to avoid arXiv for my publications completely although i have an endorsement there.

References of Ted Jacobson 1995 about Gravity and Thermodynamics 11, the Watson and Cricks on DNA 1953, six, Higgs-Paper 1964 two, EPR 1935 had zero. Like Einsteins 1905 paper.

 

[Esim Can]

E.g. a theory or model that is not testable, verifiable or falsifiable is generally non-scientific, and, even if it is, it doesn't become accepted science unless it is eventually tested and verified or generally gets established equivalently in an official accepted way (by the scientific community etc.)

Very important point, yes. In my case it predicts the normal order of the neutrino-masses, which will be soon tested i think. If the neutrino-mass-order are irregular, then my model is wrong. This is a falsifiable prediction. A very important constant is dependent on that in my model. But besides that, the rest depends if the derivations, which lead to results are correct or not. Fortunately my Professors first words in our first talk was, "Be warned, i have no time to be diplomatic, if it is nonsense i will say 'nonsense'!" His help is like a lottery win.

 

[Dale]

My denied paper had 9 references i think and the most recent is 1996

And you believe the rejection was misusing power?

And believe me, i searched everything, which could only be near to that what i try to do. Because in many points i had difficulties to formulate it, and needed the work of others, who went a similar way. I wish i found some, but no. There were and are none.

You are simply mistaken if you think you have foundational work with only 9 relevant references today.

Hopefully your new friends can help you put your work into a modern context.

 

[Esim Can]

@Dale
I understand your point, but this is exactly why I distinguish between peer review and arXiv moderation. You describe how you would handle a journal submission, but arXiv is explicitly not a journal and its moderators do not evaluate scientific correctness or the depth of the literature review. They only perform an administrative filter, and they state that clearly in their policies.

Since you mentioned that you have never submitted to arXiv, our perspectives simply come from different experiences. My criticism is not about peer review at all. It is only about the fact that arXiv rejections should not be interpreted as scientific judgments, because that is not what they are designed to be.

 

[Dale]

and they state that clearly in their policies.

Such as https://info.arxiv.org/help/endorsement.html

Where the arxiv policy says “You should not endorse the author if the author is unfamiliar with the basic facts of the field, or if the work is entirely disconnected with current work in the area.”

Shall i put all the failed attempts in there saying how they tried it, why it did not worked out, or the other ones tried it, did not worked because of the violation of that principle and so on.

Absolutely! Especially with foundational work. How else do you think you can put your work into context? Your references should include all of the relevant advancements and their limitations, particularly where those limitations are discussed in subsequent work up to the present day.