The men who stare at science

Abstract

In science, success is largely defined by publishing scientific results in relevant journals. To evaluate the quality and significance of the reported research, journals are ranked by so-called impact factors, which are surrogate measures of quality. Writing science is, however, much more than just reporting numbers and statistics, and a personal measure of career. In this regard, authorship in science has become a muddy matter, as most scientific papers in medicine and natural sciences now often have many authors. Indeed, coauthorship constitutes a large part of scientific life, and this sometimes leads to difficulties in giving the rightful people intellectual credit. In the context of modern scientific endeavors, the word ‘author’ is in danger of becoming a misnomer, as it still refers to the person writing the paper (and is distinct from an editor who shapes someone else’s original work). With scientific papers having multiple authors, it is almost impossible to accept the word ‘author’ for each individual. To use the analogy, many scientific authors, therefore, may be seen as men who stare at science rather than proper authors who do the writing.