I wonder if it will be possible in future at some time to publish without author(s) name (may be like Bourbaki http://www.ams.org/notices/200709/tx070901150p.pdf ). How it will be managed? What will be its benefits and risks?
Dear @Ismat, I have read the review on both Bourbaki's books, and I still do not have the good response! I do not see yet the clear reasons for the authors to be anonymous!
Dear @Ismat, I have read the review on both Bourbaki's books, and I still do not have the good response! I do not see yet the clear reasons for the authors to be anonymous!
I think it is too early to think of having author-free publications. This suggestion has many complications and may find many problem regarding promotion criteria, faculty staff achievements, motivations. It is difficult to think of it now.
In future to stand out the scientific studies instead of the authors identity may be a good idea. But I think it may have some serious risks and problems. Only one of them author's name is an identifier for that article and unidentified article's content will be less safe for other authors. Because the author's earlier articles are a reference for other ones.
I do not think that this will be possible in the future. Open access journals are expected.
It is of a very remote chance and if at all that happens, authors wouldn't be as open to publish as of now...
@Ljubomir and @Costas,
The mention of Bourbaki brings to mind something very important: focusing on a topic rather than focusing on the authors who have written about a topic. The very interesting thing about Bourbaki is that the books written by Bourbaki have been written by members of a small group of researchers, who preferred to remain anonymous.
Charles Denis Sauter Bourbaki was a French general who fought in the Franco-Prussian war in 1870–71. A hoax lecture given by students at the ´Ecole Normale Sup´erieure to the entering class in 1923 culminated with a “Bourbaki theorem.” In 1935, a group of mathematicians, many of whom had taken part in that lecture, as either audience or pranksters, decided to adopt that name for the fictive author of the modern treatise of analysis they were planning to write.
https://www.imj-prg.fr/~david.aubin/publis/sous%20presses-b.pdf
So, for example, there is a Bourbaki volume on Set Theory, which is a venerable work. Here is chapter 7:
http://www.tau.ac.il/~corry/publications/articles/pdf/bourbaki-structures.pdf
My response to the question for this thread is to shift the emphasis for authors to anonymously written publications in which ideas and results are freely given to students. I think that is quite possible, if small groups of researchers agree to coauthor papers and books as gifts to civilization.
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@Ljubomir Jacić: I do not see yet the clear reasons for the authors to be anonymous!
The question has surprising subtlty and is not easy to answer. Models for anonymous authorship abound, if we consider publications up through the 1970s, with the
> predecessors of Euclid whose discoveries in geometry are wonderful but many of the geometers themselves are unknown.
> anonymous sources of philosophical sayings, poems and plays were common in antiquity.
> issues of Punch were filled with anonymously drawn cartoons and anonymously written stories and essays. Until the 1890s, anonymity was an unwritten policy in Punch. The focus was on the cartoons themselves and the ideas in the essays, not on the authors.
> the volumes from the Bourbaki group are an outstanding example of agreed-upon anonymity by a group of prominent mathematicians. Again, the anonymity of the authors of the mathematics in the Bourbaki volumes shifts the focus from the authors to the subject matter.
Dear Ljubomir, there you have a clearcut rationale for considering the anonymity of some publications in an effort to shift the emphasis from authors to ideas. This means that ideas from young authors have just as much importance as the ideas from veteran (perhaps famous) authors, if the authors remain anonymous.
Perhaps you have other examples of anonymously written publications. It would be good to consider various examples of anonymity.
I do absolutely agree with your attitude dear @James! There is no need for anonymity in this area!
If this "author free publications" comes true then who will claim for issues rising out the article published.
Dear Krishan,
In the event that an article or a book is published anonymously, it is probably the case that the anonymous author (or group of authors) will publish under a pseudonym such as Nicolas Bourbaki.
http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/HistTopics/Bourbaki_1.html
I believe it is not so much a question of who will make claims about issues arising from an anonymous publication but rather a question about the validity of any claim made anonymously. The notion of shifting the emphasis from author of a publication to content of an anonymously witten article or book, used to be quite common before the 21st century. Obviously, we do like to know who originated a novel idea or who is the inventor. Besides Boubaki, can you think of any other examples of anonymous publications?
In this technology bridging era, such a fantasizing "content claim hijack" is not possible. Today we can pin point from which 'geo' position "who does what"... actually we have learnt to accept to be transparent, even if not, the technology is permissible for audit and decrypt....
Dear Krishnan,
Of course, your observations about technology bridging are valid (for the most part) but I do think it is possible to publish anonymously (especially as a group more interested in a subject rather than disputing who in a group made the most important contribution in a assembling a document for publication). In fact, it is commonplace for large companies such as Bell Labs or Microsoft or (sometimes) university departments to publish whilte papers and technical reports, anonymously.
Perhaps you know of some examples of white papers or reports published anonymously. I can think of one such document that is known worldwide, namely, the documentation and user's guide for
Nikon camera such as the D7000 with accompanying CD
The authors of scientific paper/communication must be prepared to take the responsibility. Authors of scientific artcles have to be prepared to stand by what they write and therefore they should be listed.
It also helps for literature review, when I see a author who written 2 or articles on the subject, I usually search his/her other publications.
@ James
Nikon camera such as the D7000 with accompanying CD is a product profile and a Market Literature. In that case the Institution or the Product Seller is the author, which quite similar to any label on a bottle with content, Therefore it cannot be considered as Scientific publication.
Why this idea need to be promoted -- publication without authors?/ it seems to me as a home without residents.....................
Dear Colleague salaam!
Please find a paper highly relevant to this question titled|:
A Study of Open Access Journals Using Article Processing Charges
by Solomon et Bjork
KIndest regards,
FBMB.
Do you mean publishing without credit/
Wikipedia publishes this way, it tends to be excellent for mathematics and mathematical statistics. I am a little less certain about other subjects. For one thing its review process includes a lot of folks you would not get on a scientific journal (not necessarily your peers).
For research publications, as the authors are creators, they need to be projected for their research work. It has a lot of positives of citations for furthering the research and also motivates the creating team to go further.
Previous entries’ examples in favor of anonymous authorship like: white papers; Bourbaki ; Wikipedia; technical reports; a note that geometers before Euclid were anonymous; a note that it is only in 21-st century that authorship is a general rule – do not look convincing:
- White papers are typically industrial marketing materials (marketing collaterals)
- Technical reports used to be engineering guidelines, educational, or informational materials
- The Bourbaki ‘s example is unique in showing as to how valuable an abstract intellectual product can be, and how far from reality can be their authors – it is an exception having no followers even in mathematics
- Wikipedia is a wonderful educational product, but, initial authors of articles are not necessarily creators of the data, even to a greater extent it is related to the next authors possibly correcting further this article
- The Euclid example might be true, but the level of truce, reasoning, motivation, etc. blurry through the dust of the centuries
- Authorship is not a 21-st century general trend – at least since the bitter dispute between Newton and Leibnitz for the calculus authorship, every scientist in a right mind had signed one’s product for more than over three centuries by now.
The questions – “How it will be managed? What will be its benefits and risks?” - seem a bit premature, as it is not clear what would be the actual drivers towards a solution like anonymous authorship.
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