The New Economic Windows Series, derived from Massimo Salzano's ideas and work, incorporates material from textbooks, monographs and conference proceedings that deals with both the theoretical and applied aspects of various sub-disciplines ...

En este artículo se pretende exponer la antropología de Eugenio Trías como clave de comprensión de toda su filosofía. Para ello se estudia primero su ontología, en torno al ser del límite, y los tres cercos: cerco del aparecer, cerco hermético y cerco del límite. En un segundo momento se estudia su antropología filosófica, propiamente dicha, que analiza al hombre como habitante de la frontera o ser fronterizo. El hombre es entendido como un límite entre lo divino y lo animal, (...) entre la naturaleza de la que proviene (nacimiento) y el arcano hacia el que se mueve (muerte). Por último se analiza cómo esta antropología de Trías permite acceder a campos que la filosofía había descuidado, como pueden ser la ética y la religión. (shrink)

In a recent opinion paper, it was argued that individuals with multiple retractions or a record of academic misconduct should not serve as editors, including as editors-in-chief, on the editorial boards of scholarly or academic journals. As a first step towards appreciating how such a policy could be applied in practice, the presence of 30 individuals listed on the Retraction Watch Leaderboard on editorial boards was screened. Six cases are highlighted to gain an appreciation of the potential reputational risks that (...) journals and publishers might incur by including individuals with a tainted academic record on editorial boards. Given the reputational, legal and other risks associated with this type of assessment and decision, more formal positioning and guidance are needed by global ethics policy-related bodies such as COPE, the ICMJE, and the CSE, even more so in journals that claim to follow these organizations’ ethical guidelines. (shrink)

The role of academic satisfaction on persistence and successful academic behavior has been the focus of research for decades. Nevertheless, driven by positive educational psychology, subjective well-being has been highlighted as another central feature in the academic path of students. Studies aimed at identifying the variables that contribute to explain different aspects of academic performance have been widely investigated, although studies aimed at identifying the determinants of subjective well-being are still limited. The present paper examined the contribution of AS judgments (...) on subjective well-being. To this end, it was hypothesized that SWB levels depend on the balance between positive/negative emotions and life satisfaction judgments. Furthermore, it was stipulated that AS has an indirect contribution on SWB, through life satisfaction, whereas the balance of emotions influences both AS judgments and life satisfaction. Using an analysis strategy based on structural equation modeling, the results indicated that the model fitted satisfactorily, explaining 32% of the variance of SWB. Particularly, it was observed that AS judgments contributed to life satisfaction judgments. Although no direct contribution of AS on SWB was reported, a total contribution partially mediated by life satisfaction judgments was revealed. These findings support the importance of academic satisfaction judgments, not only because of their importance in academic terms, but also because of their impact on university students’ subjective well-being and health. (shrink)

Most clinical neurofeedback studies based on functional magnetic resonance imaging use the patient's own neural activity as feedback. The objective of this study was to create a subject-independent brain state classifier as part of a real-time fMRI neurofeedback system that can guide patients with depression in achieving a healthy brain state, and then to examine subsequent clinical changes. In a first step, a brain classifier based on a support vector machine was trained from the neural information of happy autobiographical imagery (...) and motor imagery blocks received from a healthy female participant during an MRI session. In the second step, 7 right-handed female patients with mild or moderate depressive symptoms were trained to match their own neural activity with the neural activity corresponding to the “happiness emotional brain state” of the healthy participant. The training was carried out using the rt-fMRI NF system guided by the brain-state classifier we had created. Thus, the informative voxels previously obtained in the first step, using SVM classification and Effect Mapping, were used to classify the Blood-Oxygen-Level Dependent activity of the patients and converted into real-time visual feedback during the neurofeedback training runs. Improvements in the classifier accuracy toward the end of the training were observed in all the patients [Session 4–1 Median = 6.563%; Range = 4.10–27.34; Wilcoxon Test, 2-tailed p = 0.031]. Clinical improvement also was observed in a blind standardized clinical evaluation [HDRS CE2-1 Median = 7; Range 2 to 15; Wilcoxon Test, 2-tailed p = 0.016], and in self-report assessments [BDI-II CE2-1 Median = 8; Range 1–15; Wilcoxon Test, 2-tailed p = 0.031]. In addition, the clinical improvement was still present 10 days after the intervention [BDI-II CE3-2_Median = 0; Range −1 to 2; Wilcoxon Test, 2-tailed p = 0.50/ HDRS CE3-2 Median = 0; Range −1 to 2; Wilcoxon Test, 2-tailed p = 0.625]. Although the number of participants needs to be increased and a control group included to confirm these findings, the results suggest a novel option for neural modulation and clinical alleviation in depression using noninvasive stimulation technologies. (shrink)

The natural instinct for members of the Committee on Publication Ethics, which now number almost 12,200, as well as academia, is to assume that this organization works under strict and clearly defined ethical parameters, with a solid vision, and an independent mandate that is not influenced by power, think tanks, or partisan interests. Naturally, whistle-blowing and science shaming are not practices that one would usually associate with an ethics organization like COPE, because they involve ethically and morally questionable practices. Despite (...) this, ethical borders have become blurred between the objectives of Retraction Watch and PubPeer, two self-moderated science watchdogs that rely heavily on these questionable practices, in their efforts to grow and survive, and the values espoused by COPE. A Retraction Watch post, in which the former COPE Chair, Virginia Barbour, made a claim of apparent harassment, is the most striking example of the dangers when collaboration may take place between science-shaming websites, and an ethics organization, COPE. These bonds appear to have been in development for a number of years already, with the inclusion of Elizabeth Wager, the former COPE Chair, as a director of The Center for Science Integrity Inc., Retraction Watch’s parent organization. Retraction Watch was financed by, among other groups, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, whose leader, John Arnold, an ex-Enron trader, declared a “war on bad science”, which may naturally include the destruction of aspects of science as well. Retraction Watch embraces several infamous pseudonymous personas under the broad umbrella of freedom of speech, liaising thereby with PubPeer. There is no doubt that errors in the literature need correcting, but this apparent connection with COPE raises questions about the basic ethical foundation of this relationship. Are scientists to embrace this bond between COPE and science watchdogs and pseudonymous whistle-blowers as the new normal in the correction of the scientific literature? This opinion piece puts forward arguments why the author believes that the ethical compass of COPE has become skewed. (shrink)

Is the societal-level of analysis sufficient today to understand the values of those in the global workforce? Or are individual-level analyses more appropriate for assessing the influence of values on ethical behaviors across country workforces? Using multi-level analyses for a 48-society sample, we test the utility of both the societal-level and individual-level dimensions of collectivism and individualism values for predicting ethical behaviors of business professionals. Our values-based behavioral analysis indicates that values at the individual-level make a more significant contribution to (...) explaining variance in ethical behaviors than do values at the societal-level. Implicitly, our findings question the soundness of using societal-level values measures. Implications for international business research are discussed. (shrink)

The blogosphere is full of personalities with masks, or pseudonyms. Although not a desired state of public communication, one could excuse the use of pseudonyms in blogs and social media, which are generally unregulated or weakly regulated. However, in science publishing, there are increasingly strict rules regarding the use of false identities for authors, the lack of institutional or contact details, and the lack of conflicts of interest, and such instances are generally considered to be misconduct. This is because these (...) violations of publishing protocol decrease trust and confidence in science and bring disrepute to those scientists who conform to the rules set out by journals and publishers and abide by them. Thus, when cases are encountered where trust and protocol in publishing are breached, these deserve to be highlighted. In this letter, I focus on Neuroskeptic, a highly prominent science critic, primarily on the blogosphere and in social media, highlighting the dangers associated with the use of pseudonyms in academic publishing. (shrink)

This article provides current Schwartz Values Survey (SVS) data from samples of business managers and professionals across 50 societies that are culturally and socioeconomically diverse. We report the society scores for SVS values dimensions for both individual- and societal-level analyses. At the individual-level, we report on the ten circumplex values sub-dimensions and two sets of values dimensions (collectivism and individualism; openness to change, conservation, self-enhancement, and self-transcendence). At the societal-level, we report on the values dimensions of embeddedness, hierarchy, mastery, affective (...) autonomy, intellectual autonomy, egalitarianism, and harmony. For each society, we report the Cronbach’s α statistics for each values dimension scale to assess their internal consistency (reliability) as well as report interrater agreement (IRA) analyses to assess the acceptability of using aggregated individual level values scores to represent country values. We also examined whether societal development level is related to systematic variation in the measurement and importance of values. Thus, the contributions of our evaluation of the SVS values dimensions are two-fold. First, we identify the SVS dimensions that have cross-culturally internally reliable structures and within-society agreement for business professionals. Second, we report the society cultural values scores developed from the twenty-first century data that can be used as macro-level predictors in multilevel and single-level international business research. (shrink)

Chronic diseases are the main disease burden worldwide, leading to premature deaths and poor individual and population health outcomes. Although modern medicine has made significant progress in developing effective treatments, only around 50% of people follow long-term treatment recommendations in high-income countries and presumably even less in low-income and middle-income countries.1 Health outcomes for chronic diseases follow a social gradient across socioeconomic groups, suggesting that the 50% adherence rate distributes unequally across social groups, affecting those who live in disadvantage the (...) most despite universal health coverage.2 Bioethicists have largely ignored inequalities that arise from differences in adherence to long-term treatments and the importance of the ethical dimension of chronicity for clinical practice. As I discuss in detail elsewhere, the concept of ‘chronic disease’ lacks a successful and agreed definition, failing to be structured in a traditional way and allowing for a disjunctive group of diseases to fall under the concept.3 Still, the main element that helps distinguish ‘chronic diseases’ from all other diseases is their long duration, so the noun chronicity can help demarcate and identify the nature of ‘chronic disease’. Drawing on conceptual analysis and phenomenological research on illness that highlight the tension between the cyclical and static elements of chronic disease, I have argued that chronicity has a phenomenological sense beyond its …. (shrink)

This paper explores that the topic of ethics dumping, its causes and potential remedies. In ED, the weaknesses or gaps in ethics policies and systems of lower income countries are intentionally exploited for intellectual or financial gains through research and publishing by higher income countries with a more stringent or complex ethical infrastructure in which such research and publishing practices would not be permitted. Several examples are provided. Possible ED needs to be evaluated before research takes place, and detected prior (...) to publication as an academic paper, because it might lead to a collaborative effort between a wealthier country with restrictive ethical policies and a less wealthy country with more permissive policies. Consequently, if that collaboration ultimately results in an academic paper, there are ethical ramifications of ED to scholarly communication. Institutional review board approval is central to avoid ED-based collaborations. Blind trust and goodwill alone cannot eliminate the exploitation of indigenous or “vulnerable” populations’ intellect and resources. Combining community-based participatory research using clear codes of research conduct and a simple but robust verification system in academic publishing may reduce the risks of ED-based research from being published. (shrink)

Academic publishing is undergoing a highly transformative process, and many established rules and value systems that are in place, such as traditional peer review (TPR) and preprints, are facing unprecedented challenges, including as a result of post-publication peer review. The integrity and validity of the academic literature continue to rely naively on blind trust, while TPR and preprints continue to fail to effectively screen out errors, fraud, and misconduct. Imperfect TPR invariably results in imperfect papers that have passed through varying (...) levels of rigor of screening and validation. If errors or misconduct were not detected during TPR’s editorial screening, but are detected at the post-publication stage, an opportunity is created to correct the academic record. Currently, the most common forms of correcting the academic literature are errata, corrigenda, expressions of concern, and retractions or withdrawals. Some additional measures to correct the literature have emerged, including manuscript versioning, amendments, partial retractions and retract and replace. Preprints can also be corrected if their version is updated. This paper discusses the risks, benefits and limitations of these forms of correcting the academic literature. (shrink)

Purpose Whistle-blowing, which has become an integral part of the post-publication peer-review movement, is being fortified by social media. Anonymous commenting on blogs as well as Tweets about suspicions of academic misconduct can spread quickly on social media sites like Twitter. The purpose of this paper is to examine two cases to expand the discussion about how complex post-publication peer review is and to contextualize the use of social media within this movement. Design/methodology/approach This paper examines a Twitter-based exchange between (...) an established pseudonymous blogger and science critic, Neuroskeptic, and Elizabeth Wager, the former COPE Chair, within a wider discussion of the use of social media in post-publication peer review. The paper also discusses false claims made on Twitter by another science watchdog, Leonid Schneider. The policies of 15 publishers related to anonymous or pseudonymous whistle-blowing are examined. Findings Four issues in the Neuroskeptic–Wager case were debated: the solicitation by Wager to publish in RIPR; the use of commercial software by Neuroskeptic to make anonymous reports to journals; the links between “publication ethics” leaders and whistle-blowers or pseudonymous identities; the issues of transparency and possible hidden conflicts of interest. Only one publisher out of 15 scientific publishers examined claimed in its official ethical guidelines that anonymous reports should be investigated in the same way as named reports, while three publishers referred to the COPE guidelines. Originality/value No such Twitter-based case has yet been examined in detail in the publishing ethics literature. (shrink)

In the academic world, despite their corrective nature, there is still a negative stigma attached to retractions, even more so if they are based on ethical infractions. Editors-in-chief and editors are role models in academic and scholarly communities. Thus, if they have multiple retractions or a record of academic misconduct, this viewpoint argues that they should not serve on journals’ editorial boards. The exception is where such individuals have displayed a clear path of scholarly reform. Policy and guidance is needed (...) by organizations such as the Committee on Publication Ethics. (shrink)

Multiple authorship is the universal solution to multi-tasking in the sciences. Without a team, each with their own set of expertise, and each involved mostly in complementary ways, a research project will likely not advance quickly, or effectively. Consequently, there is a risk that research goals will not be met within a desired timeframe. Research teams that strictly scrutinize their modus operandi select and include a set of authors that have participated substantially in the physical undertaking of the research, in (...) its planning, or who have contributed intellectually to the ideas or the development of the manuscript. Authorship is not an issue that is taken lightly, and save for dishonest authors, it is an issue that is decided collectively by the authors, usually in sync with codes of conduct established by their research institutes or national ministries of education. Science, technology and medicine publishers have, through independent, or sometimes coordinated efforts, also established their own sets of guidelines regarding what constitutes valid authorship. However, these are, for the greater part, merely guidelines. A previous and recent analysis of authorship definitions indicates that the definitions in place regarding authorship and its validity by many leading STM publishers is neither uniform, nor standard, despite several of them claiming to follow the guidelines as set forward by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors or ICMJE. This disparity extends itself to ghost and guest authorship, two key authorship-related issues that are examined in this paper to assess the extent of discrepancies among the same set of STM publishers and what possible influence they might have on publishing ethics. (shrink)

This paper starts by establishing a prima facie case that disadvantaged groups or individuals are more likely to get a chronic disease and are in a disadvantaged position to adhere to chronic treatment despite access through Universal Health Coverage. However, the main aim of this paper is to explore the normative implications of this claim by examining two different but intertwined argumentative lines that might contribute to a better understanding of the ethical challenges faced by chronic disease health policy. The (...) paper develops the argument that certain disadvantages which may predispose to illness might overlap with disadvantages that may hinder self-management, potentially becoming disadvantageous in handling chronic disease. If so, chronic diseases may be seen as disadvantages in themselves, describing a reproduction of disadvantage among the chronically ill and a vicious circle of disadvantage that could both predict and shed light on the catastrophic health outcomes among disadvantaged groups—or individuals—dealing with chronic disease. (shrink)

Authors endure considerable hardship carrying out biomedical research, from generating ideas to completing their manuscripts and submitting their findings and data (as is increasingly required) to a journal. When researchers submit to journals, they entrust their findings and ideas to editors and peer reviewers who are expected to respect the confidentiality of peer review. Inherent trust in peer review is built on the ethical conduct of authors, editors and reviewers, and on the respect of this confidentiality. If such confidentiality is (...) breached by unethical reviewers who might steal or plagiarize the authors’ ideas, researchers will lose trust in peer review and may resist submitting their findings to that journal. Science loses as a result, scientific and medical advances slow down, knowledge may become scarce, and it is unlikely that increasing bias in the literature will be detected or eliminated. In such a climate, society will ultimately be deprived from scientific and medical advances. Despite a rise in documented cases of abused peer review, there is still a relative lack of qualitative and quantitative studies on reviewer-related misconduct, most likely because evidence is difficult to come by. Our paper presents an assessment of editors’ and reviewers’ responsibilities in preserving the confidentiality of manuscripts during the peer review process, in response to a 2016 case of intellectual property theft by a reviewer. Our main objectives are to propose additional measures that would offer protection of authors’ intellectual ideas from predatory reviewers, and increase researchers’ awareness of the responsible reviewing of journal articles and reporting of biomedical research. (shrink)

Resumen:La obra capital de Phillip Mainländer se compone de seis capítulos (Analítica de la facultad cognoscitiva, Física, Estética, Ética, Política, Metafísica) y un Anexo (Crítica de las doctrinas de Kant y Schopenhauer). Seis capítulos y un anexo que hacen gala de la intempestividad de su autor. De esa cualidad presente en pocos pensadores y que condiciona la valoración de su obra al paso del tiempo. De esa cualidad que permite pensar más allá de los límites que impone la época. Curiosamente (...) un pensador del siglo XIX ilumina los tiempos que corren. Unos tiempos signados por prácticas ecocidas y sus derivaciones ecosuicidas (Baquedano: 37-38), y cuyas primeras manifestaciones físicas sobre la naturaleza comenzaron, llamativamente, en dicho momento, a saber, en 1784 cuando James Watt patentó su máquina de vapor. (shrink)

Most departments in any field of science that have a sound academic basis have discussion groups or journal clubs in which pertinent and relevant literature is frequently discussed, as a group. This paper shows how such discussions could help to fortify the post-publication peer review movement, and could thus fortify the value of traditional peer review, if their content and conclusions were made known to the wider academic community. Recently, there are some tools available for making PPPR viable, either as (...) signed or anonymous comments, or in a hybrid format. Thus, limited platforms are currently in place to accommodate and integrate PPPR as a supplement to traditional peer review, allowing for the open and public discussion of what is often publicly-funded science. This paper examines ways in which the opinions that emerge from journal clubs or discussion groups could help to fortify the integrity and reliability of science while increasing its accountability. A culture of reward for good and corrective behavior, rather than a culture that protects silence, would benefit science most. (shrink)

The editors of scholarly journals have a duty to uphold and promote the highest standards of ethical conduct of research. They also have a responsibility to maintain the integrity of the literature, and to promote transparency and honesty in reporting research findings. In the process of screening manuscripts they receive for possible publication, editors have the obligation to report infractions to the institutions of offending authors, and request an investigation. Since editors can reject a paper on ethical grounds, they can (...) be considered to be the guardians of ethics who should express high ethical standards in conducting and publishing their own research. An examination of several publishers’ websites reveals no such requirement or clear selection criteria for journal editors. Therefore, we aim to discuss the factors that publishers, in a broad sense, should consider when selecting editors for scholarly journals and believe that such criteria should be made public to ensure accountability. This would restore some of the eroding public trust in disseminated research, fortify confidence in the composition and qualification of members of an editorial board, and help to protect the reputations of publishers and editors. (shrink)

As part of a continuous process to explore the factors that might weaken or corrupt traditional peer review, in this paper, we query the ethics, fairness and validity of the request, by editors, of authors to suggest peer reviewers during the submission process. One of the reasons for the current crisis in science pertains to a loss in trust as a result of a flawed peer review which is by nature biased unless it is open peer review. As we indicate, (...) the fact that some editors and journals rely on authors’ suggestions in terms of who should peer review their paper already instills a potential way to abuse the trust of the submission and publishing system. An author-suggested peer reviewer choice might also tempt authors to seek reviewers who might be more receptive or sympathetic to the authors’ message or results, and thus favor the outcome of that paper. Authors should thus not be placed in such a potentially ethically compromising situation, especially as a mandatory condition for submission. However, the fact that they do not have an opt-out choice during the submission process—especially when using an online submission system that makes such a suggestion compulsory—may constitute a violation of authors’ rights. (shrink)

El presente manuscrito intenta, a través de una sucinta reflexión, dar cuenta de cómo el cuidado de sí rescatado por Foucault podría ser comprendido como una alternativa para superar los mecanismos identitarios de control neoliberal, gracias a la relación activa que el sujeto desarrolla con la verdad. En el entendido de que el abandono del espacio de la norma y el conocimiento por parte de aquella, y su ubicación al servicio de la autoconformación del sujeto favorecería el desarrollo de una (...) relación plena y coherente de cada individuo consigo mismo. (shrink)

A surge in post-publication activity related to editing, including by technical editors and copyeditors, is worthy of some discussion. One of these issues involves the issue of 'tortured phrases', which are bizarre terms and phrases in academic papers that replace standard English expressions or jargon. This phenomenon may reveal an attempt to avoid the detection of textual similarity or to masquerade plagiarism, and yet remain undetected by editors, peer reviewers and text editors. Potentially thousands of cases have already been discovered (...) and reported publicly on the post-publication platform PubPeer. In this opinion paper, 35 cases from ranked scholarly journals are presented, mainly the fields of materials, computer and engineering sciences. This collation serves to expand discussion about this integrity-related phenomenon and to increase educational awareness of the topic. (shrink)

Retractions of COVID-19 literature in both preprints and the peer-reviewed literature serve as a reminder that there are still challenging issues underlying the integrity of the biomedical literature. The risks to academia become larger when such retractions take place in high-ranking biomedical journals. In some cases, retractions result from unreliable or nonexistent data, an issue that could easily be avoided by having open data policies, but there have also been retractions due to oversight in peer review and editorial verification. As (...) COVID-19 continues to affect academics and societies around the world, failures in peer review might also constitute a public health risk. The effectiveness by which COVID-19 literature is corrected, including through retractions, depends on the stringency of measures in place to detect errors and to correct erroneous literature. It also relies on the stringent implementation of open data policies. (shrink)

A very important event took place on January 15, 2017. On that day, the Jeffrey Beall blog was silently, and suddenly, shut down by Beall himself. A profoundly divisive and controversial site, the Beall blog represented an existential threat to those journals and publishers that were listed there. On the other hand, the Beall blog was a ray of hope to critics of bad publishing practices that a culture of public shaming was perhaps the only way to rout out those (...) journals—and their editors—and publishers who did not respect basic publishing ethical principles and intrinsic academic values. While members of the former group vilified Beall and his blog, members of the latter camp tried to elevate it to the level of policy. Split by extreme polar forces, for reasons still unknown to the public, Beall deliberately shut down his blog, causing some academic chaos among global scholars, including to the open access movement. (shrink)

A psychiatric advance directive (PAD) is a communication tool that promotes patients’ autonomy and gives capacitated adults who live with serious mental illnesses the ability to record their preferences for care and designate a proxy decision maker before a healthcare crisis. Despite a high degree of interest by patients and previous studies that recommend that clinicians facilitate the completion of PADs, the rate of implementation of PADs remains low. Research indicates that many clinicians lack the necessary experience to facilitate the (...) completion of PADs and to use them, and, as a consequence, do not effectively engage patients about PADs. This study developed practical recommendations for clinicians to improve their ability to communicate and facilitate PADs. We (1) thematically analyze definitions of PADs published in 118 articles across disciplines, and (2) present our recommendations for enhanced communication in clinical practice that emphasize patient-centeredness, usefulness, and clarity, aligned with evidence-based practices that put patients’ autonomy and understanding first. While there is no one-sizefits- all script to engage patients in complex conversations, our recommended strategies include an emphasis on patients’ autonomy, the adaptation of word choices, the use of metaphor not simile, and checking for patients’ understanding as effective methods of clinical communication. (shrink)

The blogosphere is full of personalities with masks, or pseudonyms. Although not a desired state of public communication, one could excuse the use of pseudonyms in blogs and social media, which are generally unregulated or weakly regulated. However, in science publishing, there are increasingly strict rules regarding the use of false identities for authors, the lack of institutional or contact details, and the lack of conflicts of interest, and such instances are generally considered to be misconduct. This is because these (...) violations of publishing protocol decrease trust and confidence in science and bring disrepute to those scientists who conform to the rules set out by journals and publishers and abide by them. Thus, when cases are encountered where trust and protocol in publishing are breached, these deserve to be highlighted. In this letter, I focus on Neuroskeptic, a highly prominent science critic, primarily on the blogosphere and in social media, highlighting the dangers associated with the use of pseudonyms in academic publishing. (shrink)

Publishing has become, in several respects, more challenging in recent years. Academics are faced with evolving ethics that appear to be more stringent in a bid to reduce scientific fraud, the emergence of science watchdogs that are now scrutinizing the published literature with critical eyes to hold academics, editors and publishers more accountable, and a barrage of checks and balances that are required between when a paper is submitted and eventually accepted, to ensure quality control. Scientists are often under increasing (...) pressure to produce papers in an increasingly stringent publishing environment. In such a climate, timing is everything, as is the efficiency of the process. Academics appreciate that rejections are part of the fabric of attempting to get a paper published, but they expect the reason to be clear, based on careful evaluation of their work, and not on superficial or unsubstantiated excuses. A desk rejection occurs when a paper gets rejected even before it has entered the peer review process. This paper examines the features of some desk rejections and offers some guidelines that would make desk rejections valid, fair and ethical. Academics who publish are under constant pressure to do so quickly, but effectively. They are dependent on the editors’ good judgment and the publisher’s procedures. Unfair, unsubstantiated, or tardy desk rejections disadvantage academics, and editors and publishers must be held accountable for wasting their time, resources, and patience. (shrink)

While concerned with how man achieves his status as a moral being, Friedrich Schiller develops a concept of play that serves as a bridge between our sensuous existence to the rational, realizing moral freedom. In what ways might we extend this concept to the non-human animal? Current research by play theorists and ethologists has shown that play behaviour in animals is both complex and crucial in determining social patterns, and Schiller’s account may have anticipated these observations. I argue that through (...) Schiller’s theory of play and our current research on animal play, it is possible to undermine the systematic removal of the animal from the moral realm that happens in modern philosophy. Through play theory, there is a possible way to undermine the assumption that animals are incapable of achieving the status of moral agents, providing an alternate route to the standard view of animals as moral patients. (shrink)

This opinion paper takes aim at an error made recently by Clarivate Analytics in which it sent out an email that congratulated academics for becoming exclusive members of academia’s most cited elite, the Highly Cited Researchers. However, that email was sent out to an undisclosed number of non-HCRs, who were offered an apology shortly after, through a bulk mail, which tried to down-play the importance of the error, all the while praising the true HCRs. When Clarivate Analytics senior management was (...) contacted, the company declined to offer an indication of the number of academics who had been contacted and erroneously awarded the HCR status. We believe that this regrettable blunder, together with the opacity offered by the company, fortify the corporate attitude about the value of the journal impact factor, and what it represents, namely a marketing tool that is falsely used to equate citations with quality, worth, or influence. The continued commercialization of metrics such as the JIF is at the heart of their use to assess the “quality” of a researcher, their work, or a journal, and contributes to a great extent to driving scientific activities towards a futile endeavor. (shrink)

Retractions are on the rise as a result of a surge in post-publication peer review and an emboldened anonymous whistle-blowing movement. Cognizant that their brand may be damaged as a result of not...