I always wonder what will happen to all these high impact articles in ten years. they will become obsolete? i don't agree or I agree.
Ten years is a very arbitrary time span. It very depends on the field of research, on the results and on several other factors. There are classic articles still read and cited after many decades.
I agree with Wolfgang R. Dick that 10 years is arbitrary and even not an appropriate time scale. For example the Wagner tectonic plates it took about 30 -40 years to be recognized. Similar story about Ohm law. In my personal capacity, I have published a paper 30 years ago and only now it got over 10,000 reads while it was dismissed when it was published. So the time scale is wrong. Also it is very hard to judge the impact. For example, my work on ship stability and navigation changed the course of the understanding. In fact now papers and books with over 1000 citations are turned out to be wrong and violate many basic physical principles. When I discuss these findings with these authors they have no expiation to their work. So what happened to these works? they will be around and there will be people who even continue citing them without realizing these works are pure trash for about 30 years or so.
Hello Dr Elias Mjaika Ndifon
I agree with Drs Wolfgang R. Dick and Genick Bar-Meir that 10 years is very arbitrary and papers outside or this window are often still relevant (especially if their value is better understood and accepted later). In general, I would try to use more recent references in my own papers if they contain the same information and ideas. Classical articles are still relevant (and citable) for a long time after.
Dr. Elias Mjaika Ndifon
Thank you very much for asking a pertinent question.
I am in agreement with all the esteemed members who advised that ten years period is arbitrary. In addition I would like to say
Knowledge if it is the core area does not get old. It therefore, remains forever. Sometimes it gets replicated as an textbook example.
Any knowledge may get overridden by new findings. In such a case the previous one would be old and obviously 'obsolete' as well.
I will quote two examples of astronomical observation records. Older than 10 years but not obsolete.
1. Surya Siddhanta, a Hindu astronomy treatise. It has a reference to an observation and record of concurrent two polestars, one at the north pole, star name Abhijit and the other at the south polestar, star name Agastya. Native astronomers understood and remembered it as an old or a very old record. Enter Western astronomy experts around 1800 CE. Everyone read it but could not relate to any information known to them. Therefore, simply ignored it. As a matter of fact it was there ignorance. They did not know what to interpret of this observation. They did not believe native astronomers, as none could recall physically seeing this phenomenon.
Around 2000 CE, Western Scientists/astronomers invented astronomy simulators. With improved star data and other astronomy equations they demonstrated that around 12000 BCE, Vega was very near to the NCP (North Celestial Pole). Concurrently the star Canopus was located at the SCP. None of these inventors had ever read the record of the situation in Surya Siddhanta. About two years ago, I stumbled across two different documents. One was Surya Siddhanta itself. The second one indicating the recorded information from astronomy simulator. Correlating both, I could date the record of Surya Siddhanta to c. 12000 BCE.
2. Vayu Purana and Matsya Purana, two Hindu sacred scriptures, understood to be historical records of Hindu civilization, contain a reference to a polestar. The name of the star is mentioned as Dhruva, a star located at the tail but outside the modern constellation of Draco. This suggests that the information pertains to the current polestar Polaris which matches with the statements recorded in the scriptures. As such the record of the observation mentioned in two Purana could be belonging to a time around 24,000 BCE.
Compare the assessed age of quoted records with the statement of the discussion initiated by you.
Regards.
Elias, core knowledge remains core knowledge if it can not be invalidated or refuted. If your knowledge was published more than 10 years ago or one year ago or yesterday, and it is invalidated or refuted today, then it become obsolete knowledge from today.
Are you familiar with the work of Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn?
When there is a paradigm shift from status quo knowledge to higher level status paradigm then a paradigm shift knowledge gap is created as the old knowledge base is left behind as it does not work in the new paradigm and to operate efficiently in the new paradigm the paradigm shift knowledge gap created needs to be closed. Then you have the old knowledge base and a new knowledge base where the old is obsolete and the new is current. The current remains current until it is invalidated or refuted.
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