The real question however is, are these "peer reviewed" in the proper and
strict sense.
There are also "Who's Who's" out there, some of them just accept and print
whatever the subject sends in. So the discovery of exactly what steps the
publication goes through is pertinent.
Just being the "member news" organ of an academic journal isn't a guarentee
that the material is reviewed for veracity.
Will Johnson
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In a message dated 1/7/2009 2:46:30 PM Pacific Standard Time,
dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com writes:
though most historical journals publish what amount to
articles with major biographical content on individuals, some of t hem
explicitly biographies. Similarly, journals in other fields often
publish at least a few biographies of major figures in that field.>>
------------------------
Names.
I intend to content them directly to find out exactly what sort of
"checking" they do or don't.
Will Johnson
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In a message dated 1/7/2009 12:08:33 PM Pacific Standard Time,
dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com writes:
unless the fame is very recent, there almost
invariably will be peer-reviewed articles discussing both his life and
his specific career, and of course they should be included.>>
-----------------
I have serious doubts that this is the case.
Hard-cover biographies are not "peer-reviewed" whatsoever.
And, as in my last message, I would be interested in what journals can be
found that are "peer-reviewed" that only submit biographies.
Will Johnson
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Other than just nay-saying my opinions, with your own opinions, do you have
a *positive* opinion on the topic?
Which is whether our BLP's in general suffer from "low citation quality" ?
There's a certain glamour in just nullifying someone else's position, but I
don't think that's going to propel us forward.
Will Johnson
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In a message dated 1/7/2009 2:46:30 PM Pacific Standard Time,
dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com writes:
Hard cover bios from academic publishers are invariably peer reviewed,
usually by three consultants, as well as the usually expert editorial
staff.>>
---------------------
Hard cover bios from commericial publishers are not "peer reviewed" and I
seriously doubt even academic publishers submit them to "peer" review in the
proper sense.
They are sometimes sent as gratis copies to editors of small magazines and
so on, to solicit back-cover comments. But there is no requirement, not
intent, to modify the contents of the project *based* on any of those comments.
The in-house editors are not validating or verifying the contents of the
work, they are checking the English usage and so on, just as editors at
commercial houses do. Looking for obvious blunders, is not the same as a critique on
the thesis itself.
That's not the same as "peer" review at all, in the sense that we are using
it for the hard sciences.
Will Johnson
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In a message dated 1/7/2009 4:21:27 AM Pacific Standard Time,
wilydoppelganger(a)gmail.com writes:
Of course, there are some. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alar_Toomre
cites a few peer reviewed papers, although one is by the subject. But
that's still only ~10% of the total references, and the biography
mostly recounts the science he's done.>>
-----------------------------------------
I think in general biographical tidbits are not reviewed in the sense that
"peer review" is trying to project.
In a paper on "Mitochrondrial Influences of Bat-Wing Geese population
studies..." I don't think any of the *peers* are really *verifying* themselves
statements like "Mr Brown was born in Topeka and graduated from Bradford
University in 1982..."
What they are verifying, either with their own knowledge or by
experimentation or consultation, is the *science* in the papers, not the biographical
snippets.
So my point, in this thread, is that I don't know of any actual
"peer-reviewed" biographical journals, who has biographies of living persons, and whose
main or sole point is biography.
Will Johnson
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<<In a message dated 1/6/2009 7:11:00 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,
cbeckhorn(a)fastmail.fm writes:
The vast majority of citations
are to newspapers, new magazines, and online news and opinion sites,
while very few are to peer-reviewed publications. >>
Can you point to any source in a BLP which comes from a "peer-reviewed
publication" ?
I mean any of them at all?
Will Johnson
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<<In a message dated 1/7/2009 1:43:54 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
saintonge(a)telus.net writes:
The real contributors function best in the topics that
interest them, and if they're lucky they'll avoid the wrath of some
autocratic know-nothing that wants to impose the literal interpretation
of obscure policy.
If you do not find primary sources acceptable that's fine; don't use
them in your own writing. That does not justify your dictating such a
semantic distinction on others.>>
No organization can function with only fingers and no arms.
"...do not find primary sources acceptable" has nothing whatsoever to do
with my position or with policy.
And "your dictating" is a situation that does not exist. "Semantic
distinction" sounds a bit off-hand since most writers do use the terms "primary
source" and "secondary source".
I have never dictated my opinion upon others.
Perhaps you would want to read the thread again, from the beginning and see
why this line of thrust is not relevant.
Will Johnson
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<<In a message dated 1/7/2009 1:26:12 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
saintonge(a)telus.net writes:
One merely writes about
what he finds; if there is a controversy there will always be someone
else available to document the other side.>>
Sure, but with balance. The main point here in this side-thread was should
we write up research papers (essentially).
And the counter is, if the paper has become important enough to be in our
project, some secondary work will have mentioned it.
That mention then opens the door to cite the primary work as well.
If *no one has mentioned it* that is pretty much the essential point of "Is
it important?"
If everyone is ignoring you, then you're not important enough to have a
biography certainly.
This works for people and for papers.
(Actually if you can show evidence that *everyone* is ignoring you, you may
be important.... but that's another world.)
Will Johnson
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<<In a message dated 1/6/2009 2:54:03 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,
cbeckhorn(a)fastmail.fm writes:
What would you make of decades-old papers that are well known and
accepted by everyone in the area, but not covered by review texts
because nobody feels a need to do so? This is the situation with much
mathematical research.>>
------------------
Sure. 150 to 200 years ago, Sophie Germain published a very valuable
insight into Fermat's Last Theorem. Her work actually is interesting for some
other related equations as well. We mention this already, in brief, but some
readers might like the complete set of steps she followed and their results.
You can find hundreds of citations to her work, in both primary and secondary
material.
The reason is because her work was important for an interesting problem, and
we should report it. That we can easily find it cited in secondary
material, then opens the door to provide primary source information, such as the full
paper itself if we wish.
However, there is an article I was reading a while ago, about how common
certain digits are in the expansion of pi. The general feeling might be that
all digits should occur with an even chance, and the paper was discussing
whether this in-fact occurred.
Interesting perhaps to some, but if no secondary source mentions it, even if
many people have heard of this paper, then it probably wouldn't be
appropriate for us to mention it either, thereby giving some obscure author credence
on some insignificant observation.
Just because everybody has heard of something, doesn't mean it's
encyclopedic.
An object takes on increased significance, with the number of publications
mentioning it.
Do we want a work that has a list of the 3 billion known stars numbers each
with their own articles showing their apparent brightness, density and
distance from the Earth? It would swamp the entire project. "Random page" would
become worthless.
So we focus on what others have determined to be important, based on the
number of citations to it.
Will Johnson
**************New year...new news. Be the first to know what is making
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