Suppose you're writing a paper in which the three key prior results are A, B, C. Let's say that C is the most recent of the three, and discusses A and B. But C completely misrepresents the work of A and B, to the extent that it starts to undermine the very premise of C !
Now you have to discuss these prior papers: what do you do ? The conservative approach is to ignore the issue, and merely discuss A, B, and C correctly. If it starts sounding like C doesn't make any sense in the light of the correct rendering of A and B, then that's too bad.
But suppose it really bothers you that C got away with this ? Is it appropriate to mention C's misinterpretation (as politely as possible) or is it not worth it ? Would your answer be different if the paper were for a conference or for a journal ? Would the identity of the authors of C matter ? Should you just suck it up and take the high road ?
From the viewpoint of science, it would be most ethical, and in fact the high road, to (politely) discuss the misinterpretation, so as to give the correct information to people new to the area. At the end of the day, we are here to advance science, not to do better networking. But perhaps I'm being naive :)
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to answer without any specifics, but I think you could objectively yet accurately discuss the issue. Something like "[C] shows XXX. Note that although [C] claims that [A,B] do not handle case YYY, in fact they do (see [A; Section 3] and [B; Appendix D]).
ReplyDeleteA related question: suppose you're one of the A/B authors, and you see C online (yet unpublished). In this case, C, although later than A/B, is strictly dominated by A/B in every way and misrepresents itself to make it seem that this is not the case. You contact C's authors -- it's clear they don't care. What should you do? How about putting a note on arXiv?
ReplyDeleteUnrelated question 2: What if a paper you read is buggy (to the point it kills the paper), and when you contact the authors it's clear they have no interest in creating an erratum?
I agree with the previous comments. At some level I feel obligated to the reader to provide clarification of such issues, but it should be done politely.
ReplyDeleteYou might even want to notify the authors of "paper C" to let them know you noticed a mistake in their work, and are providing clarification in an upcoming paper.
I would probably keep out of it and take the high road. It's very possible that there is some history between the authors of A,B and C that I don't know. (For example, an earlier version of A and B did not handle XXX, and then the journal version did, and so on.) Unless I know, I would give C the benefit of the doubt.
ReplyDeleteAs a student, I also hope that you'll take the approach of politely explaining the full scientific truth.
ReplyDeleteComment nonchalantly that "Note, that a result similar to C can be derived by combining A and B." Leave the reader to conclude that C is crap.
ReplyDeleteIn short, take the high road, but provide all the relevant data.
--S
I am puzzled by descriptions of avoiding the truth as the "high road". Our responsibility as academics is to report the truth. There is nothing lowly about pointing out the faults of C in your work. In fact, it is quite the opposite: it shows great character to put truth before politics, and in the process you will have saved many researchers from wasting time with C.
ReplyDeletetrash talk C as much as the editors/reviewers let you get away with. oh wait, this is computer science, there aren't real reviewers, which is why C published bullshit in the first place.
ReplyDelete