A Key to Scientific Research Literature

"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."    — Douglas Adams (1952—2001), British writer. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Introduction.

I don't know where those came from, they were floating around on the 'Net.

Research literature

What is written

What it means

It has long been known that...

I haven't bothered to look up the reference, but...

While it has not been possible to provide definite answers to these questions...

The experiment didn't work out, but I figured I could at least get a publication out of it.

The following conditioning system was chosen to study the problem.

The lab next door already had the equipment set up.

Three samples were chosen for detailed study.

The results on the others didn't make sense and were ignored.

Accidentally strained during mounting.

Dropped on the floor.

Handled with extreme care throughout the experiment.

Not dropped on the floor.

Typical results are shown.

The best results are shown, i.e. those that I expected.

Agreement with predicted curve: Excellent / Good / Satisfactory / Fair

Fair / Poor / Doubtful / Imaginary

Correct within an order of magnitude.

Wrong.

Of great theoretical and practical importance.

Interesting to me.

It is suggested that... it is believed that... it appears that...

I think that...

It is generally believed that...

A couple of other people think so too.

The most reliable results are those obtained by Jones.

Jones was my graduate student.

Fascinating work.

Work by a member of our group.

Of doubtful significance.

Work done by someone else.

It is clear that much additional work will be required before complete understanding.

I don't understand it.

A quantitative theory to account for these results has yet to be formulated.

I can't think of one and neither can anyone else.

Thanks are due to Glotz for assistance and Doe for valuable discussion.

Glotz did the work and Doe explained what it meant.

Extremely high purity.

Composition unknown, except for the exaggerated claims of the supplier.

Presumably/at longer times.

I didn't take the time to find out.

Trivial.

It took me a whole week to figure it out.

We have obtained...

We have borrowed, and we don't intend to return it.

Reasons Why God Never Received Tenure at the University

• He had only one major publication.
• It was in obscure languages.
• It had no references.
• It wasn't published in a refereed journal.
• Some even doubt he wrote it himself.
• It may be true that he created the universe, but what has he done since then?
• His cooperative efforts have been quite limited.
• The scientific community has had a hard time replicating his results.
• He never applied to the Ethics Board for permission to use human subjects.
• When one experiment went awry he tried to cover it up by drowning the subjects.
• When subjects didn't behave as predicted, he deleted them from the sample.
• He rarely came to class, just told students to read the Book.
• Some say he had his son teach the class.
• He expelled his first two students for learning too much.
• Although there were only ten requirements, most students failed his tests.
• His office hours were infrequent and usually held on a remote mountaintop.

Can you spot the real scientist ?

GOOFUS has a PhD.
GALLANT has a PhD in a field unrelated to his research.

GOOFUS gets little respect as a scientist outside the scientific community.
GALLANT gets little respect as a scientist inside the scientific community.

GOOFUS drives a beat-up old car.
GALLANT drives a BMW unless his chauffeur is driving.

GOOFUS wears street clothes to work, maybe a lab suit on occasion.
GALLANT wears three piece suits at all times.

GOOFUS is employed by a "university", a "hospital", or a "laboratory".
GALLANT is employed by a "Coalition", an "Institute", an "Association", a "Foundation", a "Council", or a "White House".

GOOFUS earns $30000 per year unless they cut his funding.
GALLANT earns $200000 per year but makes his real money from speaking fees.

GOOFUS lives anywhere in the country.
GALLANT lives in a wealthy area near Washington DC, but may have additional homes elsewhere.

GOOFUS may sometimes be filmed standing in front of big melting icebergs.
GALLANT may be filmed sitting in front of a bookcase or standing behind a podium at a $2000 per plate fundraiser, although there may be ice melting in his drink.

GOOFUS is a dues-paying member of several scientific grassroots organizations.
GALLANT is on the payroll of several scientific astroturf organizations.

GOOFUS gets summoned for jury duty but is never picked as a juror.
GALLANT claims "the jury is still out" on evolution or global warming, since he considers himself to be on the jury.

GOOFUS maintains the world is five billion years old.
GALLANT isn't really saying, but creationists distribute his pamphlets all the time.

GOOFUS claims the world is warming as a direct result of human activity.
GALLANT either claims that climate change doesn't exist, or if it does, that humans have nothing to do with it.

GOOFUS and his graduate students do the dirty work of collecting raw data and looking for conclusions to be drawn from it.
GALLANT does the dirty work of discrediting GOOFUS by manipulating his data in Excel with statistically invalid techniques.

GOOFUS writes scientific papers and grant proposals.
GALLANT writes the nation's environmental legislation and a column for the Wall Street Journal's editorial page.

GOOFUS draws scientific conclusions from the data he collects that usually come out in agreement with the scientific consensus.
GALLANT paints the scientific consensus as being entirely political in nature and enjoys comparing himself to Galileo.

GOOFUS is heavily trained to be a skeptic and to treat information from all sources with a skeptical mind.
GALLANT is heavily marketed as a skeptic but reserves his skepticism for GOOFUS.

GOOFUS isn't paid much attention by the press since his opinions are commonplace among scientists.
GALLANT holds maverick opinions for a scientist which keeps him busy running from one balanced talk show to the next.

GOOFUS has no PR skills.
GALLANT leverages his PR experience all the time, although he has access to paid PR staff.

GOOFUS claims the sky is falling and we have to take painful steps to reduce CO2 emissions now.
GALLANT claims the free market will take care of it and recommends solving the problem by conning Zimbabwe out of their pollution credits.

GOOFUS advises his kids not to go into science.
GALLANT advises the president.

Go take a look at the science quotes or the Engineering Terminology.