Old wine in a new bottle is a phrase for expressing an existing concept or institution offered as though it were a new one.
In my field of study (evolutionary/nature inspired algorithms) I bumped into some proposed algorithms/methods (cuckoo search, bat algorithm, grey wolf algorithm ,...) that are highly cited in academic papers in various engineering fields of study. After reading a lot of papers on evolutionary algorithms and their origins I personally (and also many others) believe that many of the new algorithms are "fabricated methods created by cutting and glueing parts of a few old and well-known algorithms and adding some story about the behaviour of an animal or natural phenomena to call it nature inspired !".
I categorize the researchers who use these Old-wine-in-a-new-bottle evolutionary algorithms into 2 groups:
- (group 1) The ones who are mere users, and only want to write a new paper or the ones who have little knowledge of this field,
- (group 2) and people who are familiar enough to see that these methods are modified/cut-and-glued old methods with fancy new names but nothing new!
I presume that many of the people reading this question have experienced this "Old wine in a new bottle situation" as "group 2" researchers in their fields.
I am wondering "How should we respond to it? or is it good/bad and why ?"
I accept that I have not concealed my (subjective) disapproval of "old wine in a new bottle notion" in this question. and I apologize.
Dear Hossein, two answers:
1. If someone posts something "old" must cite the source, or commits plagiarism.
2. If someone is based on the "old wine" to generate new knowledge, must cite the source, nonetheless, he or she, will be creating something new (not just the bottle).
Kind regards, Luis
Its all in the mind.
Example of Work place change and upgrades to employees in an organization. As change is location brings in a different attire to the product, similarly the employee when changed to a new spacial location cleaves of all the negatives from the earlier location by incorporating the necessary changes (physical / mental/ behavioural) required right from the early time of change. The feel good factor brings better output. Also brings in a preparedness towards sense of change / achievement
The old wine should be preserved: its bouquet spreading over times, with an ageing process motivating tasting, i.e., a technical, and objective evaluation in order to be reinvented and reborn according to conditions required for rapidily changing demands . Consequently, the essence of the old will always prevail making researchers feel the sensation of freshness in their mouth.
This is a saying used from time immemorial. Whenever we try to face lift or articulate something which is old, then we utter this. This saying connotes some kind of a superficial nature.
I agree with everyone's comment and I don't really think the change in the bottle can change its taste
How does old wine taste in a new bottle in your opinion?
I think it depends on the acceptability of the Research & Development (R&D) community or / and market demand. The bundle of old wine (content) in new bottle (packaging) or newly researched wine in new bottle are different forms of creation / innovation in different degrees. Since R&D & market / customers at large have different tastes, purchasing powers, agendas etc., they might accept different bundles differently according to their needs & affordability.
Unfortunately, many times, nowadays, a new bottle merits much more than its content and especially, if this is an ‘old wine’.
There are cases in which the taste of the ‘old wine’ is even unknown, that is, a citation (new bottle), in a published work (another new bottle), which does not correspond to the ‘old wine’ (citation of the initial old method).
On the other hand, there are cases in which Journals, in their guidelines to authors, require references to be recent, usually of the last decade and, this may be a limited factor for an ‘old wine’.
Nevertheless, a serious matter of ethics often arises and surely, a ‘new bottle’ is not suitable for an ‘old wine’ without distinct moral rules.
Now a days, every thing depends on marketing and publicity nothing else. In my opinion, such practices are not scientifically acceptable and never be encouraged.It is the responsibility of scholars,Peer reviewer and readers to check it.It is a serious matter of violation of ethics in scientific publishing. Of course, old wine will continue to remain as old wine.
Any expert can easily identify and characterise wine or wine quality irrespective of type of bottle. I have read some publications and raised similar questions through the letter to the editor or comments or query on such publications. These are available in my profile and are really very interesting articles. Even some questions were raised pertaining to human errors in analytical measurements,human errors -simply due to greediness for quick and short-cut gains, evaluation of attributes of scientists, etc are mind blowing, simply to create awareness among scholars and scientific community.
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