Space Babe

@CharonY I agree with your opinion. Your remarks are very logical.

I am not really introduced with the methods and types of reviews that were applied during that time (since you mentioned that peer-review was not an established process), but I often wonder why would they give more relevance to a paper that lacks evidence to support a claim? Also, what kind of review was used instead of peer-review? 

What was the factor that made that change, or transfer, for papers to start being peer-reviewed? 

10 hours ago, Strange said:

And linguistics (in pretty much all branches) meets these requirements. There can be a certain about of subjectivity and judgment in some areas (eg. in reconstructing proton-languages) but the methodology is generally rigorous.

I completely agree with your opinion. Linguistics represents the application of a scientific method in order to question the function and nature of language.

It's fascinating how linguistics tend to overlap not only with social sciences, but with natural sciences as well, with the purpose of discovering how language exactly is reserved in the humans brain, and how language is relevant in human behavior, which actually makes us special compared to the other living creatures on this planet.  

@Mordred

Thank you!

5 minutes ago, CharonY said:

It is usually an arrangement between your supervisor and them. For the most part we want students to be on the first position, as it cements the contribution of the lab/group of the PI. But there are exceptions when things can get political (e.g. large collaborative projects that end up in Nature/Science). That fight, however, is typically not fought by the students as at that point there is also a lot money and work time involved, which goes beyond the person having an idea.

I see what you mean. Thank you so much for your advice, I really appreciate it  

I originally have one supervisor, or mentor (he is actually my mentor since I was 18 - when I presented a scientific hypothesis to him). He is also a part of the research project, so I guess that he will negotiate in my name with the other researchers. 

But I suppose that, if things get really serious, than the student doesn't have much power in that fight. 

9 minutes ago, CharonY said:

It is not only about the credit stealing in my mind. So, if you look at the paper published by Franklin, you'll see that while supportive of a helix structure, the quality of the diffraction was insufficient to establish irrevocable evidence of it. She pretty much acknowledges that,  in the report. I think (but may be wrong) that she may have intended to improve resolution with further experiments, which was not possible after Watson & Crick sold their structure based on her data. Or I should say, "oversold". At least from the viewpoint of an experimentalist. They just happened to be right.  So while she was the first to provide structural data supporting the now known structure, it was W&C who went ahead and really sold it.

But again, this does show my bias coming from the more experimental side of things.

You may have a point, even though your opinion is biased. As I can remember, I don't think that Franklin ever proposed the model.

But when you think about it, Franklin is acknowledged in some sort of way, even though it is not how it is usually expected; 

18 minutes ago, CharonY said:

Edit:

One thing that you might want to get used to is that ideas are cheap in  academia. It is to a large degree of getting it done (performing experiments, collecting data, analyzing and writing the manuscript) that count. 

Thank you.

Yes, I am aware of that, since the idea must be supported and validly proven, otherwise, it may not even be taken seriously. 

5 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

You'll be lead author, won't you?

I hope so. I know that they all contribute to the research project, however I believe that I deserve to be the lead author as you say. Because as I have mentioned before, all the research ideas are mine, I just presented them to the researchers and they agreed to work with me.

I am feeling nervous mostly because they are much more experienced than me (they have like over 100 published papers and researches) and of course because they are much older.

30 minutes ago, Strange said:

Bethe did not contribute, but was listed as an author. That annoyed Alpher because having two prominent scientists listed diminished his role (and it was nearly all his work).

I see what you mean. In any case, that really seems unfair and I think than anyone would feel displeased in this situation. 

Once again, thank you for explaining.

12 minutes ago, CharonY said:

The award itself is less of an issue, she died before it was given out (though it would have been interesting to see what would have happened if she had been alive). Rather problematic is that she was not on the paper and that subsequently the work was almost exclusively with Watson and Crick. That in itself is problematic on several levels.

Nobel prizes aren't awarded posthumously, so she did not receive any credit in the research, nor do I believe that she received a share in the prize for her contribution. 

However, I think that all of this credit stealing started when Wilkins (who worked separately from Franklin) showed Watson and Crick (without permission) Franklin's image of DNA, also known as Photo 51.

6 minutes ago, CharonY said:

In most disciplines only two position count: first author (usually student), last author (PI/mentor). In natural sciences at least It is exceedingly rare that a student gets a paper submitted to a mainstream journal without going over the desk of a PI. Contributions on a paper are iffy, and groups often have different policies which can differ quite a bit from generally accepted standards.

I completely agree with your opinion, as I have also experienced that.

Usually I have always published scientific papers with only one mentor, who would often like to contribute.

But I never had any experience with group publishing. I am a bit nervous about this because I started working with three researchers (even though all the research ideas are mine) and I don't really know how things will turn out when we will have to publish our results. 

14 minutes ago, Strange said:

And, of course, there is a bit of a history of senior researchers getting Nobel Prizes for work that their (often female) students or colleagues did (structure of DNA, discovery of pulsars).

I have also heard about this. I think that Rosalind Franklin was not awarded the Nobel Prize for her contribution to the discovery of the structure of DNA. In other words, she was snubbed due to sexism. 

5 minutes ago, Strange said:

Not quite the same, but Ralph Alpher (who was a PhD student at the time) wrote a paper with his supervisor George Gamow. Gamow thought it would be funny to add his friend Hans Bethe as second author (because it sounds like  α, β, and γ). Alpher resented this at the time and for decades after.

I have never heard of this case, thank you for telling me about it.

But are you trying to say that all three of them together were considered as coauthors?

Did Bethe even contribute to the paper? 

This is a very interesting topic, not to mention very useful

Just like Arete, I was also a bit confused by the question since I couldn't tell if the member was asking about papers before or after being published in scientific journals.

Because once you publish a paper in a scientific journal, that means it is officially your idea and other interested people can only cite your work or base their own paper on it.

But when it comes to someone stealing your idea before you officially publish it as your own, I would say that the most likely possibility of that happening is if you share your idea with other people, among who someone might want to steal it and write a paper about that same topic.

52 minutes ago, Lizwi said:

In order to publish, is it necessary to have a PhD or any formal qualification?

I agree with Strange that, when it comes to publishing a scientific paper, that is not really necessary.

So far, I have managed to publish a couple of scientific papers, even though I haven't even graduated from college.

However, according to my personal experience, you will need a mentor who can also be your professor or someone who has a Master's degree or a PhD in order to publish your paper.

Of course, you and your mentor can be both considered as coauthors, even if you are the one that wrote the paper. But in most cases, the mentor usually wants to contribute as well.

And even if this is the case, you must be careful and make sure that you can trust your mentor, because I have heard about some situations where the professor or mentor steals the student's idea and publishes it as his/her own.

This has not happened to me, fortunately, but still you need to be cautious whom you present your idea to. 

12 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

Probably pre-wired to respond that way... except when one is deaf.

I guess your explanation makes sense.

Like in technology, pre-wiring represents the ability to add something is present in the basic design, but the option must still be added;

So, the basic design represented the listener's hearing (that is, the interaction between our brain and our ears) before the auditory illusion. However, after the auditory illusion is heard (for the first time), its effect is added in the way our brain, through our hearing ability, can easily be tricked  into hearing sounds differently, hearings sounds that are not part of the stimulus, or "impossible" sounds.

We can't experience auditory illusions if we have never heard them before, if we can only partially hear them (or if we cannot hear them at all due to being deaf). 

28 minutes ago, Strange said:

It is interesting the the effect "sticks" for so long. I thought it might wear off after a while.

I know, right? Initially, I had the same thought but when I heard the sound demos again after a long period of time, I realized that the illusion still works.

I wonder why is that so? 

1 hour ago, dimreepr said:

what religion is that?

I am not necessarily talking about religion here, but rather explaining that people often see themselves as superior in comparison to the other living organisms on this planet. Therefore, this may be one of the reasons and possible motivations as to why people (of all religions) believe in an afterlife - they perceive their existence to be more relevant than the rest of the animals. Of course, this can also apply to atheists as well, but they perceive their place on this planet a bit differently.

In general, I don't think humans believe that there is an afterlife for animals as well. Except maybe in ancient times when people were polytheists and worshiped animals...

In other words, the psychology of human's self awareness and self-perceptions compared to the other living creatures may give us an explanation for the question why people believe in god.

But like I've said in my previous post, this is just my personal opinion. 

55 minutes ago, Strange said:

We have all seen optical illusions, but auditory illusions are a bit rarer. Here is an example I remember reading about years ago. Hearing a spoken phrase repeatedly can make it sound as if it is sung. And after that, you can't hear it as not being sung!

http://deutsch.ucsd.edu/psychology/pages.php?i=212

(This is also a good example of experimental method because of the various ways they demonstrate that the effect is real and the same for multiple listeners.)

I have listened to this auditory illusion before, I think from a documentary called Mind Works on Da Vinci Learning  

I listened to all seven sound demos and no matter if the sentence is sung or spoken, I always hear it as singing. This confirms what you said that you can't hear the sentence as not being sung!

In the first sound demo particularly, from the whole sentence, only the part saying "Sometimes behave so strangely" is heard as being sung. It's like when you suddenly start singing while talking, and when that particular part is pronounced, you continue to hear the sentence as speaking.

I think that there are two main reasons why certain people still believe in god;

The first reason is due to the assumption that humans are acataleptic by nature, meaning that they are facing with the real or apparent impossibility to arrive at certain knowledge or full comprehension. 

This being said, believers will always try to fill their lack of knowledge and understanding to a supernatural force beyond them and their existence. This is also known by the term "God of the Gaps".

The second reason is mortality salience, that is, the fear of mortality and death. That is why humans would rather live their whole life believing in a beautiful lie, than facing the ugly truth and harsh reality. 

I would also presume that besides fear, people are narcissists - as the self-claimed most intelligent creatures living on this planet, it is almost non acceptable for them to think that their end will be the same as the other animals, whom they consider as inferior.

However, this is just my personal opinion and I don't mean to offend anyone with this comment.

1 hour ago, FlatAssembler said:

What do you guys think, where do people get that idea that linguistics is not a real science from?

Originally, there are  two major divisions of science - Natural sciences and Social sciences;

Natural sciences are disciplines designed to predict and explain events that occur in our natural environment (Physics, Biology, Chemistry...), while Social sciences  are usually fields of academic scholarship which explore aspects of human society (law, history, sociology...).

From this, it is clear enough to state that natural sciences study the psychical world, and social sciences study human behavior. This being said, we can easily decide in which category does Linguistics fall;

Linguistics is known as the scientific study of language and its form, meaning and structure, including the study of grammar, syntax and phonetics. However, Linguistics is a rather vast field of study and it can be divided in specific branches, such as psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics, computational linguistics, etc.

According to this official and standard definition, Linguistics seems to fall under the category of Social sciences - since it studies a certain aspect of human behavior. However, linguistics tends to have different aspects of which some of those aspects belong to natural sciences, while others belong to social sciences. For instance, the aspects of linguistics that are related to natural sciences are neurolinguistics or biolinguistics.

I think that this mix does not make linguistics and entirely social science, nor an entirely natural science, making it an interdisciplinary subject. But the fact that linguistics not being an entirely social science is not the problem here. The problem is the attitude that people have towards the two main divisions of science;

Namely, the majority of people don't really value social sciences as much as natural sciences. And since most people put linguistics under the category of social sciences, they tend to automatically doubts its scientific credibility.

But, i don't completely blame them, as they might have a good reason for their opinion. Another important argument as to why some sciences or disciplines of study may not be considered as "real sciences", and that has nothing to do with the fact that one particular science is considered as social or natural;

A scientific study must have a valid approach and methodology, based on strong evidence, and not some claims or theories that cannot be subjected to an observational state. And only when these standards are met and achieved, the field of study that is in question can be considered as a real science that has some sort of validity in the overall scientific community. 

R. P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol.1, Chaps.1,2,&3.

@nevim

I am positively surprised of your impression about my comments, and I appreciate that very much.

Especially since I am a newer member on this amazing forum...

Thank you

1 minute ago, StringJunky said:

He's still mentioned because his work is dyed into the psychology lexicon... he started it after all.

I agree and as I have previously mentioned, for instance, Freud is responsible for coining the terms id, ego, superego in the first place. A lot of people still use these terms in their papers, as they still consider them to be relevant and possibly valued in the field of psychology. 

3 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

Yes, he got the ball rolling, even if his ideas don't hold water in the end.

That is very true. I think that the very relevant question many people ask themselves is why Freud is still considered as relevant and important, even though the scientific community claims that his theories are invalid.

Freud still matters and is associated with the science of psychology because without him it is believed that humans would not have any conceptions of psychology whatsoever. He is still very popular, maybe because some of his concepts were considered as taboo, but also because our personality and behavior, according to him, is mostly biologically explained. 

6 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

'Theories' in science are those ideas with the greatest preponderance of evidence; they are the gold standard. Proofs only exist in mathematics.

Yes, thank you for the explanation. 

I mentioned that theories are not equal to proved evidence mainly because Freud's theories have not been properly proved as valid, at least from a scientific point of view. In fact, it is even taken in question if any ideas that Freud had are still relevant in the present.

In other words, maybe I should have been more clear saying that most psychological theories are not considered as valid due to the fact that others find them hard do conduct observational experiments upon their claims. 

I apologize for any misunderstandings...

38 minutes ago, Strange said:

Theories require to be confirmed by, or consistent with, evidence.

Exactly.

I said that theories are not equal to proved evidence because I was mainly referring to the fact that Freud's theories have not been properly proved as valid, at least from a scientific point of view.

38 minutes ago, Strange said:

If they can't be validated by use of evidence then they should be discarded.

Either that or someone should try and test them from a different approach, but that would still be considered as a valid evidence.

I remember how one of my professors said that without Freud, we would still be in a psychological dark age, since he first suggested that humans have a subconscious, the notion of a mental aspect,  that he coined the terms "ego, superego, id" which are still used today (although some people disagree with these terms as well).

I think that she was trying to say that although Freud may have been wrong about most things, she believed that he correctly guessed some fundamental understandings about human behavior and thinking.

38 minutes ago, Strange said:

It may be of historical interest. Or an insight into his personality and psychological problems.

Perhaps, yes.

It is also worth mentioning that Freud, as well as other famous psychologists, usually came up with some pretty bizarre concepts such as "Penis Envy" or "Womb Envy". This is due to the fact that they worked during  an era in which sexual repression was very characteristic. From this we could say that the majority of these theories were biased and subjective, of course, according to the mentality that was manifested in the society where they lived, worked and practiced.  

19 minutes ago, Strange said:

It can be a real science, as long as it relies on high quality evidence and not Freudian fairy-tales.

Of course, I agree with your opinion. Every science must be based on strong evidence. So far, Freud's work mostly relies on his psychoanalysis and theories.

And theories are not equal to proved evidence.

I wonder if there is even a possibility or method to confirm his psychological theories as valid? Maybe through analyses or conducted experiments? Because, as far as I know, Freudian theories about the brain and mind were never scientifically validated. However, with this, I am not saying that his work isn't interesting or not worth reading.

But on the other hand, I imagine that it would be difficult to analyze his theories from a scientific point of view, mainly because they cannot be easily subjected to an observational state.

49 minutes ago, iNow said:

In which case we’ve left the primary realm of psychology and entered a related, but separate, domain known as neuroscience. Their Venn diagrams certainly overlap, but one is about behavior and learning and related areas, whereas the other is about structure and chemistry and cascading flows across a network.

Yes, I agree with your opinion. 

My point, however, was that psychology, at least according to my opinion, cannot simply be discarded for "not being a real science".

I have this impression that the majority of people don't really value social sciences as much as natural sciences. And since this topic is specifically about doubting the scientific credibility of psychology, I personally don't think that it's fair to not consider it as real science, just because it mainly focuses on human behavior, when in reality, natural sciences such as biology and neuroscience, have a direct or indirect impact upon it.

I am sure that almost everyone are familiar with (transorbital) lobotomy, which starting in the 30's, was conducted upon patients who suffered from psychological/psychiatric disorders. Without getting into too much detail, lobotomy was considered as one of the methods to cure these psychological/psychiatric disorders by entering the field of neuroscience, as a neurosurgical treatment (by approaching the frontal lobes of the human brain).

With this example, I am only trying to emphasize that psychology cannot be considered as "not a real science" just because most people think it's a social science, when practice shows that there is a relevant aspect of it linked to some of the familiar natural sciences as well. And without that aspect, psychology would not be a complete science, as we usually  know it.