[Cz-editcouncil] peer-review and relevance to Citizendium

Fri Apr 27 10:08:29 CDT 2007

Maybe I missed something, if one editor accepts or rejects an article, that
is in essence a peer-review of 1, if 2 editors accept or reject, that is a
peer-review of 2. I was not suggesting that we adopt a full blown
peer-review process, but I was suggesting that having at least 2 editors
concur on accept, reject or accept with modifications would be a logical way
to proceed.

You'll never get an argument from me about the failings of peer-review, I
face that faulty system many times a year as we publish papers in journals
like PNAS and J. Neurochemistry. But Citizendium needs some type of system
in place to decide what is worthy of publication, and what is not. Based on
my many experiences with publishing, a single editor making that type of
decision is not a good way to proceed.

JRM 

-----Original Message-----
From: cz-editcouncil-bounces at voltaire.citizendium.org
[mailto:cz-editcouncil-bounces at voltaire.citizendium.org] On Behalf Of M.
BALDWIN-EDWARDS
Sent: Friday, April 27, 2007 10:47 AM
To: The Citizendium Editorial Council
Subject: [Cz-editcouncil] peer-review and relevance to Citizendium

Dear all,

Just a quick note of extreme disagreement on peer review. My own experience,
coupled with that of many colleagues, is that the process is now massively
flawed -- at least in the case of social sciences. When I was Editor of a
significant journal, I was also under great pressure to accept articles
without proper refereeing, although the publisher would vehemently deny this
in public. I suppose that very popular journals can afford to reject >90%,
but even these have problems with finding competent referees for this
process to work properly.

I mention this only because it would be silly for Citizendium to try to live
up to a standard which is professed but not adhered to by academic journals.

Martin Baldwin-Edwards

----- Original Message -----
From: "John R Moffett" <drjohn at factinista.org>
To: "'The Citizendium Editorial Council'" 
<cz-editcouncil at voltaire.citizendium.org>
Sent: Friday, April 27, 2007 2:03 PM
Subject: Re: [Cz-editcouncil] Article deletion question

> Hello All,
>
> The general rule for peer-reviewed science journals is that a minimum of 
> 2,
> and preferably 3 editors from the field review the article, and make 1 of 
> 3
> recommendations: accept, accept with modifications, or reject. Reject 
> means
> that the article is hopelessly flawed. Accept with modifications means 
> that
> there are significant problems or areas that need attention and these 
> issues
> need to be pointed out by the editors who review the article. The author 
> is
> then given time to make appropriate changes before resubmission. The 
> article
> is then re-reviewed by the editors who then give a recommendation to 
> accept
> or reject.
>
> Rejected articles are not archived or kept anywhere. But keep in mind that
> many very good articles (which were eventually published elsewhere) have
> been rejected by this process, which is only as good as the reviewers.
>
> John M.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: cz-editcouncil-bounces at voltaire.citizendium.org
> [mailto:cz-editcouncil-bounces at voltaire.citizendium.org] On Behalf Of 
> David
> Goodman
> Sent: Friday, April 27, 2007 3:54 AM
> To: The Citizendium Editorial Council
> Subject: Re: [Cz-editcouncil] Article deletion question
>
> As a layman, relying of the format  of the article and the use and nature 
> of
> the references as much as the arguments, it seems obvious that the article
> is advocacy, rather than encyclopedic--and even by Wikipedia standards 
> would
> probably be nominated for deletion as an essay.
>
> Holding it for future work by those qualified seems an obvious temporary
> solution. At Wikipedia, any one of a number of people would undoubtedly
> start editing to improve it, but in a non-systematic way.
> We should wait for people prepared to do it properly.
>
> But it is possible that the author might be prepared to revise the article
> in the light of the unanimous criticism that it is receiving, and in all
> fairness, that should be tried first. Even if it needs substantial 
> rewriting
> after that, there will be a better starting point. And we might get better
> future work from the author involved.
>
> DavidGoodman
>
>
> On 4/27/07, Nguyen Anh (DAM) <Anh.Nguyen at dexia-am.com> wrote:
>> Dear All,
>>
>> As we all know, the difference between Citizendium and Wikipedia is to
>> have a reliable encyclopedia, with an "expert oversight". In this
>> precise case, it seems obvious that the "Binary economics" has its
>> place on Wikipedia, but not here as there is much controversy on that
> subject.
>>
>> I perfectly agreed that as, up to now, there is no large acceptance of
>> that theory in the Economics field, measured by the number of articles
>> published in peer-reviewed journals.  Futhermore, Citizendium should
>> not be the place where everyone is coming with his own theory, but the
>> place where al accepted theory is presented.
>>
>> So, I do agree that this article should be kept in archives and not be
>> seen by all users. Someone belonging to the Econ Group (I am from...
>> But more from the finance side.. sorry) should try to write a short
>> and neutral article on it.
>>
>> Anh
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: cz-editcouncil-bounces at mail.citizendium.org
>> [mailto:cz-editcouncil-bounces at mail.citizendium.org] On Behalf Of
>> Larry Sanger
>> Sent: 27 April 2007 00:33
>> To: 'The Citizendium Editorial Council'
>> Subject: [Cz-editcouncil] Article deletion question
>>
>> Dear Editorial Council members,
>>
>> I'm going to try to have something like a kick-off mail in your box
>> this evening, but I wanted to get your input on something in the 
>> meantime.
>>
>> We have a shortage of active Economics editors.  I asked several who
>> are involved to comment on this article, which struck me as being
>> quite
>> biased:
>>
>> http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Binary_economics
>>
>> And we got a comment back, here:
>>
>> http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Binary_economics#Editorial_Opinion
>>
>> The opinion seems to me to entail that we should delete the article.
>> In particular, two items:
>>
>> (1) This comment is most important: "I do not think the current entry
>> can be revised to make a suitable entry for Citizendium."
>>
>> (2) The article "reads as promotional literature."
>>
>> Our rules at present state (see
>> http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ:Article_Deletion_Policy) that the
>> first two comments in particular are grounds for an *editor* to make a
>> decision to delete an article outright.
>>
>> So I would like to ask your opinion about a question of *process* here:
>> should we, in the absence of any other active economics editor
>> weighing in on the matter, rely on the opinion of a single editor to
>> delete an article on the above grounds?
>>
>> --Larry
>>
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>
>
> --
> David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.
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