人生沒有用不到的經歷

在美國讀書時，休士頓四百萬人口中，大約有二十萬華人，常常在一天結束後，好像沒講到幾句英文。在一次校園華人聚會中，某位教授說了一句話，我一直記在心裡，「在美國發表一篇Science/Nature，五年後別人早把你給忘了。」在台灣不斷有記者會發表醫學突破，半衰期更短，記者會一結束，所有的突破都不見了。今年有新生學弟問我讀國防能發表Science/Nature嗎？很不幸，去年有一位台大醫師被 Nature 殺了。對我而言，研究只是學醫的軌跡，因為研究、我更了解，如此而已。
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頂級期刊的迷思
李中志
http://www.appledaily.com.tw/realtimenews/article/new/20131223/313425/
今年的諾貝爾醫學獎由美國與德國三位知名生物學家共同獲得，其中一位是來自美國加州柏克萊大學的蘭迪‧謝克曼（Randy Schekman）教授。謝克曼早在20年前就當選為美國國家科學院的院士，歷年在頂尖期刊發表的重要論文多不勝數。然而就在上上周諾貝爾獎頒獎典禮的前一天，謝克曼在英國衛報發表了一篇令人意外的短文，宣稱以後他的實驗室再也不向頂尖的期刊發表論文，還直接點名《自然》、《細胞》與《科學》這三本生命科學界最頂尖的期刊。
 
謝克曼認為這些頂尖期刊為了衝高其「影響指數」（impact factor），以非科學的目的引導研究方向，猶如限量發行的名牌皮包，刻意製造一個不健康的競爭環境，嚴重扭曲科學研究的動機與客觀性，讓這些頂尖期刊不再是最佳科學成果的保證。其實這是離一般大眾相當遠的議題，但這篇短文一發表立刻被瘋狂傳閱，不數日便有上萬人引用，顯然已在英美的學界激起共鳴。
 
計算點數扭曲研究
頂著諾貝爾桂冠的光芒，謝克曼講出了許多研究者敢怒不敢言的心聲，但由上述期刊的主編回應來看，似乎對謝克曼的抵制不置可否，並不在意。這些期刊的態度之所以如此傲慢，來自供需失衡，對這些頂尖期刊而言，諾貝爾獎得主不算稀客。
 
隨著研究總量的暴增，學界為了方便行事，用各式各樣的指數來量化研究成果的優劣，再以計點制來評鑑研究者。但若只知機械式計算點數，研究工作將被扭曲為病態的競爭。結果就是讓許多好的研究者，尤其是剛進學院的年輕教授，為了生存只好去追逐熱門題目、漸進式發表研究成果、共同掛名、在熱門問題上對小枝小節敲敲打打，這種策略性的研究，對一個初入門的不知名研究者而言，是比創新一個新的研究方向更容易擠進頂尖期刊的。等而下之的，更有製造假數據，買賣論文的怪異現象。
 
評鑑觀念恐該調整
 
其實對「影響指數」或名牌期刊的迷信，這幾年已普遍在美國的學界引起反思，謝克曼不是第一個，也不會是最後一個。許多系所已逐漸捨棄以期刊的計點做為評鑑教授研究的唯一標準，我們認為，做為一個經過學院完整訓練的評鑑者，應該具備能力根據內容來判斷一個學術論文的好壞，而不必機械式的計算它在哪裡發表的點數。台灣學院的評鑑觀念，似乎也到了要調整的時候了。

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/09/how-journals-nature-science-cell-damage-science
How journals like Nature, Cell and Science are damaging science
The incentives offered by top journals distort science, just as big bonuses distort banking
Rendy Schekman

I am a scientist. Mine is a professional world that achieves great things for humanity. But it is disfigured by inappropriate incentives. The prevailing structures of personal reputation and career advancement mean the biggest rewards often follow the flashiest work, not the best. Those of us who follow these incentives are being entirely rational – I have followed them myself – but we do not always best serve our profession's interests, let alone those of humanity and society.

We all know what distorting incentives have done to finance and banking. The incentives my colleagues face are not huge bonuses, but the professional rewards that accompany publication in prestigious journals – chiefly Nature, Cell and Science.

These luxury journals are supposed to be the epitome of quality, publishing only the best research. Because funding and appointment panels often use place of publication as a proxy for quality of science, appearing in these titles often leads to grants and professorships. But the big journals' reputations are only partly warranted. While they publish many outstanding papers, they do not publish only outstanding papers. Neither are they the only publishers of outstanding research.

These journals aggressively curate their brands, in ways more conducive to selling subscriptions than to stimulating the most important research. Like fashion designers who create limited-edition handbags or suits, they know scarcity stokes demand, so they artificially restrict the number of papers they accept. The exclusive brands are then marketed with a gimmick called "impact factor" – a score for each journal, measuring the number of times its papers are cited by subsequent research. Better papers, the theory goes, are cited more often, so better journals boast higher scores. Yet it is a deeply flawed measure, pursuing which has become an end in itself – and is as damaging to science as the bonus culture is to banking.

It is common, and encouraged by many journals, for research to be judged by the impact factor of the journal that publishes it. But as a journal's score is an average, it says little about the quality of any individual piece of research. What is more, citation is sometimes, but not always, linked to quality. A paper can become highly cited because it is good science – or because it is eye-catching, provocative or wrong. Luxury-journal editors know this, so they accept papers that will make waves because they explore sexy subjects or make challenging claims. This influences the science that scientists do. It builds bubbles in fashionable fields where researchers can make the bold claims these journals want, while discouraging other important work, such asreplication studies.

In extreme cases, the lure of the luxury journal can encourage the cutting of corners, and contribute to the escalating number of papers that are retracted as flawed or fraudulent. Science alone has recently retracted high-profile papers reporting cloned human embryos, links between littering and violence, and the genetic profiles of centenarians. Perhaps worse, it has not retracted claims that a microbe is able to use arsenic in its DNA instead of phosphorus, despite overwhelming scientific criticism.

There is a better way, through the new breed of open-access journals that are free for anybody to read, and have no expensive subscriptions to promote. Born on the web, they can accept all papers that meet quality standards, with no artificial caps. Many are edited by working scientists, who can assess the worth of papers without regard for citations. As I know from my editorship of eLife, an open access journal funded by the Wellcome Trust, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Max Planck Society, they are publishing world-class science every week.

Funders and universities, too, have a role to play. They must tell the committees that decide on grants and positions not to judge papers by where they are published. It is the quality of the science, not the journal's brand, that matters. Most importantly of all, we scientists need to take action. Like many successful researchers, I have published in the big brands, including the papers that won me the Nobel prize for medicine, which I will be honoured to collect tomorrow. But no longer. I have now committed my lab to avoiding luxury journals, and I encourage others to do likewise.

Just as Wall Street needs to break the hold of the bonus culture, which drives risk-taking that is rational for individuals but damaging to the financial system, so science must break the tyranny of the luxury journals. The result will be better research that better serves science and society.