[Coral-List] A student's guide to the h-index

Sun Jan 3 16:16:07 UTC 2021

Dear David,

Nice to start 2021, giving free advice to students on how to become more
influential to improve Coral Reef Protection Effectiveness. However, if you
are going to mention only GOOGLE SCHOLAR then you leave behind the
scientists who have chosen better Researchgate.

I am of course on Researchgate, because it allows to include research
findings that are not just published on indexed magazines. Therefore other
scientists can not ignore the existence of goverment reports, previous
local publications and background research. Thus, avoiding the research
flaw of claiming Fake Originality!!

In my experience, to become influential you have to become activist and be
coherent leading by example. You can not go claiming dredging is bad for
coral reefs when you were hired a year ago with millions to allow dredging
Varadero reef !!

A letter that I requested to the past director of the Society for
Conservation Biology addressed in 2016, to the President Santos in
Colombia, along with my talk at the United Nations during the Ocean
Conference 2017 and at ICCB 2017 did helped a lot to stop the planning of
dredging Varadero Reef. Those plans began in 1990 and the fishers
communities went striked ever since. I just received a letter from the
National Natural Parks Officers informing their plans to include Varadero
 Reef within the boundaries of the Corales del Rosario National Park as
well as the other case study Coral Reefs Capurgana-Cabo Tiburon to be
included in the Sanctuary Playona, both are Hope Spots since IYOR  2018
Declared by Mission Blue and being evaluated for nomination as World
Heritage Sites at the Colombian Committee for UNESCO.

To improve local governance, it is relevant to involve in our research,
environmental campaigns and activities to the local artisanal fishers and
local scuba diving operators who visit every day the case studies and
suroundings

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/314153451_Galvis_N_H_y_RH_Galvis_2016_Colombian_citizen_science_to_improve_coral_reef_conservation_Citizen_Science_Proceedings_International_Coral_Reef_Session_88_606-619

To know more about our achievements follow us on Fundación ICRI COLOMBIA
Twitter @ArrecifesCoral / @ICRIcolombia Instagram
ObservatorioArrecifesCoral Youtube ICRI COLOMBIA y
Facebook.com/ICRI.COLOMBIA #OceanAction14819

El dom, ene 3, 2021 09:37, David Blakeway via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> escribió:

> Dear Coral List - been discussing this further with Mike & Dennis. And
> slowly receiving enlightenment, so.. hope you can indulge me again.
> I guess my position now is that the h-index is 'bad' in the sense that
> democracy is bad, i.e. 'the worst form of government except every other
> form that's been tried'
> And when I actually scroll through the Google Scholar pages of coral reef
> scientists I see a cascade of ideas and hard work that, well, makes me wish
> I could retract this post.
>
> BUT, it is definitely worth noting that the Hirsch 2005 paper is (imo) very
> poor work. For a start, he named the index after himself. Then we learn,
> from Dennis' digging, that he actually ripped the idea off without
> acknowledgement (the cycling index was introduced by the high-profile
> physicist Arthur Edddington, and Hirsch is a physicist - no way that's
> coincidence). And how representative can it possibly be when it's all based
> on a sample n=21 of, overwhelmingly, white middle-aged American male elite
> physicists who've probably known since age three how special they are, and
> who were selected for the analysis *because *they had a stellar list of
> highly-cited publications? That sounds like trying to characterise the reef
> fish community by examining the pack of 100kg *Caranx* circling out front.
> Grrr.
>
> On Fri, Jan 1, 2021 at 5:15 AM Dennis Hubbard <dennis.hubbard at oberlin.edu>
> wrote:
>
> > This has been an interesting thread, so I went back and looked at some of
> > the discussions about its use in cycling - where it was apparently
> created.
> > For those who have not tracked this down, "h" appears to be a number that
> > states "some rider" with a given h-score has ridden that number of rides
> of
> > that length. By way of example, a rider who has ridden 70 rides of 70
> miles
> > would have an "h-score" of 70 - certainly better than a rider who has
> > ridden 2 rides of 2 miles. The problem is that, because the number is
> > non-dimensional, a rider who has ridden 70 rides of 70 miles has the same
> > score as a rider who has ridden 70 rides of 70 km (example in Google).
> And,
> > by extension, a rider who has ridden 70 rides of 70 cm will have the same
> > score as one who has ridden 70 rides of 70 km. If I apply this analogy
> > correctly to our discussion, a rider who rides 2 rides of 2500 km will
> > receive no merit badge and, therefore has no standing compared to the one
> > who rode 70 rides of 70 m.
> >
> > More to the point, consider the poor graduate student who has published
> > only their second paper, but it is cited by 25,000 readers. (S)he either
> > doesn't qualify in this ranking... or would receive a maximum score of 2
> > (i.e., the same as published only two papers with two readers each). At
> the
> > other extreme, some prolific author (but whose research was so egregious
> > that their 2000 papers were typically cited in cited in 2000 rebuttals
> > would be an "h-god". If I am correct, Mike's statement, "Don't we
> conclude
> > from your two points that the h-index is a big big problem?" ranks near
> > infinity when it comes to an h-ranking?
> >
> > Dennis
> >
> > On Thu, Dec 31, 2020 at 10:15 AM David Blakeway via Coral-List <
> > coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
> >
> >> Mike and all,
> >> I'd like to learn more about how academia is done. As an outsider, no
> >> doubt
> >> my understanding is very incomplete.
> >>
> >> Perhaps I am focusing excessively on the h-index. And for sure that's
> >> partly because my own h-index, if I had one, would be so tiny I'd be
> >> ashamed to display it in public (but I don't want one so that's ok).
> >>
> >> BUT, reflecting on your two earlier points, which you said are more
> >> threatening to scholarship than the h-index:
> >> Your first point indicates that bureaucracy is likely to misuse the
> >> h-index, therefore isn't the h-index a big problem?
> >> Your second point I understood to mean gaming the system to artificially
> >> inflate authorship. Doesn't that equate to gaming the h-index, therefore
> >> isn't the h-index a big problem?
> >>
> >> Don't we conclude from your two points that the h-index is a big big
> >> problem?
> >>
> >> On Thu, Dec 31, 2020 at 4:09 AM Risk, Michael <riskmj at mcmaster.ca>
> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Hi David.
> >> >
> >> > Don’t mean to be a bubble-burster…I am just a cynical old guy living
> in
> >> > the forest.
> >> >
> >> > There are tons of problems with science, and only some of them are
> >> > self-inflicted. My pet peeve is…did you know that “manager” is now the
> >> > world’s most common profession? And the very idea that science can be
> >> > “managed” is repulsive. Doesn’t stop them trying.
> >> >
> >> > Way back when,. Canada used to pride itself on our granting system.
> >> NSERC
> >> > grants were restricted to 4 pages, and were reviewed by a committee of
> >> > peers. The camel got its nose under the tent flap. First, a government
> >> rep
> >> > sat in…next, the length limit was raised…then more managers...20 years
> >> down
> >> > the road, we are not much better than the soul-crushing NSF system.
> And
> >> I
> >> > don’t think we should attribute any higher motives to these managers
> >> than
> >> > we would to any other group. They will protect themselves.
> >> >
> >> > When we get involved with grading or ranking our colleagues, we really
> >> > need objective criteria, or seemingly objective. Otherwise, it’s
> >> > opinions-and they are like noses, everybody has one.
> >> >
> >> > In short, I see h-indices as one tool, to be used intelligently. Much
> >> > better, of course, is to go to the library and READ the papers on
> which
> >> > decisions will be based. I will spare you the story of the guy at our
> >> place
> >> > who MADE UP a buncha papers on the assumption no one would check. (I
> >> wanted
> >> > to fire his butt-the Dean said the paperwork would kill us and
> besides 4
> >> > more years and he’d retire.)
> >> >
> >> > #2 is a direct result, not so much of h-scores, but of the importance
> we
> >> > place on authorships. That’s as it should be, and that’s why this
> recent
> >> > hydra-like trend is so dismaying. All I will say is-have some
> >> self-respect.
> >> > Don’t do this. Because, as you say, it’s obvious what’s going on.
> >> >
> >> > Mike
> >> >
> >> > On Dec 30, 2020, at 2:14 PM, David Blakeway <
> >> > fathom5marineresearch at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> >
> >> > Mike,
> >> > Thank you! (for bursting my bubble :) I have this delusion I see the
> >> > problem, but it's only 'a' problem.
> >> > Regarding your point 1, nasty me thinks 'yeah, managers, my second
> >> > least-favourite species after marketers' Nice me thinks 'they are
> >> > well-meaning, just trying to advance the department/school/university
> >> > according to current best practice'
> >> > To point 2 it's 'come on, stop this joke, we all see what you're
> doing'
> >> > and 'worldwide collaboration is exactly what we need right now'
> >> > What do you mean when you say you 'despair of solutions'?
> >> > And isn't your point 2 a direct consequence of the h-index?
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Coral-List mailing list
> >> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> >> https://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Dennis Hubbard - Emeritus Professor: Dept of Geology-Oberlin College
> > Oberlin OH 44074
> > (440) 935-4014
> >
> > * "When you get on the wrong train.... every stop is the wrong stop"*
> >  Benjamin Stein: "*Ludes, A Ballad of the Drug and the Dream*"
> >
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