And EVEN MORE about refereeing papers

From Steve Saideman, and Phil Arena.

More on refereeing papers

Marc Bellemare of Duke responded to the refereeing discussion occurring in the econ blogosphere with his own list, which you can find here.  Very interesting reading.  I thought this point would be of interest not only to those starting to referee, but also those just beginning to write papers:

“Once you decide to get started on your review, read the title, the abstract, the introduction, and the conclusion of the paper. Do you have a good idea of what the authors are doing? Perhaps more importantly, are you convinced that it’s a worthwhile topic? If it’s an empirical paper, can you understand from the tables what relationships the authors are after? If you answer “No” to any of those questions, you should encourage the editor to reject the paper. This may sound harsh, but before submitting, authors should work hard on the “sell” of their paper, i.e., on convincing the reader that the paper is worth their time. It is true that a groundbreaking good idea that suffers from a bad sell deserves a second chance. The two, however, are rarely orthogonal to one another.”

How to referee an academic paper

Chris Blattman has some links up on how to referee an academic paper, and on how to be a discussant at a conference.  Well worth reading.

Four key assumptions in multiple regression

A useful reminder.  See the link here.

Grad School “Impostor Syndrome”

I found this post this afternoon that might be of some interest to fellow graduate students.  In this gig we’re surrounded by smart people and it’s easy to start believing you’re just not up to the same level as your classmates, i.e. you feel like an impostor that will eventually be discovered for the dolt that you are.

The post is about how most graduate students feel this way, why, and why they are nearly always wrong.  Worth reading, especially if you’re doubting yourself.

How to pick a research project

I saw that Chris Blattman put some links on his blog to some essays by economist Don Davis on how to select research topics.  Directly relevant to political science as well.  Good stuff.

Scientist in a Strange Land

Earlier this year, NASA and the scholarly journal Science received a lot of criticism for the way they handled the announcement of an important finding in natural science–that it is essentially possible for cells to use a sugar-arsenate backbone instead of a sugar-phosphate backbone in DNA, which, if true, would change the way we define what “life” is.

Last month, Popular Science published an intelligent examination of what happened in the scientific community and popular culture as a result of the NASA press conference related to the findings in the article in Science, and the way it catalyzed a very odd backlash in the blogosphere and elsewhere. It is a very important read by virtue of the fact that we are living in a far more connected and open world as each day passes, and, as a result, the way that science is practiced is changing.

You can read the full article here.

The article discusses the way that science moves through the populace very well. Although, that process is probably better described by this comic from the always-insightful PHD comics

MPSA Deadline Extended to October 14

Details here.  If you want to submit a poster the deadline is December 2.

Some funding opportunities from the SSRC

Check them out here.  Most are for IR/comparative, some have deadlines soon.

Dr. Birkland Visit Reminder

Remember that our second scholar visit of the fall is this week, as Dr. Tom Birkland comes to visit on Wednesday and Thursday.

If you’ll be coming to the graduate student informational meeting (Wednesday at 7:30pm), let Kristin know (kristinbroyhill@hotmail.com) by Tuesday at 5:00pm, so there is enough pizza for everyone.