The Philosophers' Cocoon

10 responses to “What are our professional duties?”

1. Moti Mizrahi

   April 25, 2013

   Hi Marcus,
   I don’t quite get the “clogging up the system” problem. If a submission is that bad, wouldn’t it be rejected by the editor without review? In that case, no reviewer’s time is wasted. Am I missing something?

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2. Marcus Arvan

   April 25, 2013

   Hi Moti: no, I don’t think you’re missing anything! 😉 It’s just that I’ve seen the worry expressed many times.

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3. elisa freschi

   April 25, 2013

   @Moti: did not you ever spend days reviewing a paper which was just not mature enough to be sent for review? I, for one, try to give useful suggestions to each author and I do not just write “reject” as a final judgement, with no further indications. Thus, I invest much time on such papers (I try to suggest secondary literature which could be helpful, objections which have been overlooked, etc.). I have often thought (and written) that one shoudl know oneself and pause on one’s work more, if one knows to tend to be too rush in sending out stuff.
   Plus: sometimes an article is not “bad”, but is not adding anything. The editor will not recognise it immediately (unless she is an expert on that topic), and the reviewer will need to do what the author has not done, i.e., read the relavant literature on the topic to check whether the article is really adding something to the debate or whether its author was just too lazy to check before starting to write!
   What am I missing in suggesting to read more before sending an article, if one knows to tend to run such risks?

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4. elisa freschi

   April 25, 2013

   An extreme case might be that of people who (try to) publish an article which is in itself good, but is nothing more than the translation of a previous article/book chapter and does not state it explicitely. It does not contribute to the philosophical debate, in fact it only adds clutter, because one thinks one needs to read A and B only to discover that they are the same thing. But it takes time to be detected, unless you know everything which has been written on a certain topic.

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5. Moti Mizrahi

   April 25, 2013

   Hi Elisa,
   You are talking about a case in which a paper has already passed the first gatekeeper, namely, the editor. If the system works, however, then papers that are not mature enough for review should not get passed the editor. In other words, if you are asked to review a paper, it is safe to assume that the editor has judged that the paper is worthy of consideration.

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6. Brad Cokelet

   April 25, 2013

   Moti,
   Have you spoken with editors to think this is a reasonable view of how things in fact work? It seems pretty outlandish, esp for general philosophy journals. If you were the editor, would you have the expertise to make this kind of judgment for all areas of philosophy? I assume not. And it is also probably the case that editors read several papers at one sitting and decide which to pass on to reviewers. Sure, they can cull out obvious stinkers, but they are surely going to also pass on many that have almost no chance of passing a more specialized reader’s more considered judgment.

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7. Marcus Arvan

   April 25, 2013

   Elisa: it seems to me that you’re going way beyond what a reviewer should do. I don’t think it’s a reviewer’s job to do the author’s work for them, pointing out all of the literature they’ve missed. Maybe mentioning a couple of obvious omissions would suffice. And I think I would say that I wouldn’t accept a reviewing assignment if I didn’t know the literature on the issue already.
   In short: I don’t think it’s the reviewer’s job to do the kinds of things you’re mentioning. The reviewer’s job is to clearly justify a decision on the paper, not help the author improve it. The latter is going way beyond the call of duty (though of course a good justification probably will help the author — but only as a side-effect of its main role, which is justifying an editorial decision)..

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8. Dan Dennis

   April 25, 2013

   You say ‘This raises the question: what is a morally permissible way to respond to an unjust system?’
   And ‘Why think we have a duty to “do our fair share” in a system that is deeply unfair?’
   I am not sure exactly what you are arguing here. I take it that there are better reviewers and worse reviews, better editors and worse editors. The reviewing system is deeply flawed but not totally corrupt or entirely worthless.
   One might say the same about US society as a whole. It is composed of better people and worse people, better employers and worse employers, better politicians and worse politicians and so on. Deeply flawed but not totally corrupt or entirely worthless.
   In each case – with regard to one’s role in the publishing system and one’s role in society – one should strive to always treat every person as an end, and generally act virtuously.
   Then we can debate what treating persons as ends and acting virtuously entails with regard to one’s role in the philosophy publishing system and in society as a whole.
   With regard to the philosophy publishing system, one can strive not to send out second rate papers – as you yourself now agree. One can also try to ensure that one is correct in one’s judgement regarding what is a first rate paper. Here what Elisa says makes sense. Standard tips for improving papers include: doing plenty of background reading, searching for objections, polishing the paper to ensure it is clear and well argued, and most important of all, putting the paper to one side for a while in order to be able to come back to it with fresh eyes and thus able to see its flaws. Having others read it and provide feedback is also vital. Plus, do not simply recycle and repackage stuff – as Elisa says, the desk editor will not necessarily know all the literature so may not know that the author has said something similar elsewhere, indeed the other piece may not be out yet, or may simply not be something the desk editor, or even perhaps the reviewer, will have read (reviewers won’t necessarily have read everything in the field). Plus, if one does send a paper off and gets non-stupid reviews back, take them into account in revising and improving the paper before sending it out again (something you mentioned you don’t do, you rather send the paper out again anyway).
   What Brad says also sounds right. And desk editors have limited time too…
   Marcus, many reviewers do see it as their duty to try to help people improve their papers – I thought you said you benefited from that with regard to your Philosophical Forum paper? Doing so is of benefit to philosophy so if we as reviewers seek to promote the writing of good philosophy then we will help authors improve their papers if those papers show promise – and if we have time to do so, so if our time is not taken up with papers which should not have been submitted or not have been submitted without more work.

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9. Marcus Arvan

   April 26, 2013

   Dan: thanks for pressing me on all this. Because I consider myself someone who tries to do good and treat people as ends, your points resonate. But I guess I still have a number of worries. Maybe we can hash them out.
   I agree that it’s generally good for a reviewer to approach their task in a spirit of helpfulness. I say “generally” because when I receive a paper that someone clearly dashed off (with tons of simple editing mistakes), I think a proper and virtuous response is to be a bit perturbed and rather short with one’s review. If the author didn’t take take the time to conscientiously satisfy the most basic standards of paper writing, I don’t think virtue requires giving very much help. In that context, the author just doesn’t deserve it. In general, though, I think one’s duty as a reviewer is to “do one’s job” — justifying an editorial decision — in a spirit of helpfulness. The question then is what this involves. The way I see it, it does not involve doing the author’s work for them (e.g. scouring the literature). I don’t think there’s anything virtuous about that. What I do think one is duty-bound to do is provide clear and conscientious feedback on the paper, explaining in a charitable way where one thinks the paper succeeds and fails. This is what the reviewer of my Phil Forum article did, and I am incredibly thankful for it. Moreover, I try to do the same when I review papers. But here’s the thing: I just think this reviewer was doing their job. In contrast, doing the things Elisa was talking about (going through the literature for the author) seems to me not only a waste of one’s own time, but rewarding vice on the part of the author (who now might think it is the job of reviewers to do a substantial amount of their research for them).
   As to your point about the publishing game, I agree: a good person should try to treat others virtuously, and as ends. But the question is what that involves! In this case, I want to say we all know the process is both (a) incredibly unfair, and (b) one that puts many of us in a position of extreme duress (if I don’t publish, I’m out of a job). The question then is what’s reasonable to do in such a situation. If one has very high standards for sending things out, one will presumably send very few things out, since it’s very hard to do good work. But in that case, due to the probabilities, one is likely to publish little if at all — especially given the unfairness at issue (Google reviewing, etc.). Given these facts, I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect people to have incredibly high standards for sending things out. It’s not unfair or a lack of virtue to send out work that may be second-rate given how unfair and duress-causing the situation is. Again, if I have to choose between inconveniencing a few people and my family’s long-term happiness or misery — and for my part I do think I have to choose — I think it’s entirely virtuous to prioritize the latter.
   Which brings me to your point about taking proper precautions before sending things out. Some of them I absolutely agree with. I always step away from papers for a bit before I send them out, as a little distance from them can put one in a better position to evaluate them. Some of your other pieces of advice, on the other hand — as common as they may be — don’t convince me. The main example I have in mind is having other people read your papers. Now, in general, I think this is a good and conscientious thing to do, and I do it myself (mainly by submitting things to conferences). However, in other cases, I don’t think it’s a good idea, at least for me. For again, as I’ve said before, I think people in our profession get too wrapped up in what others think of their work. Our discipline is a pretty conservative place. Everyone tells you to write very targeted papers on small ideas, and they often rip you apart for attempting to be too ambitious. But I, for one, think much of our discipline is too conservative. I think good philosophy is a good deal more ambitious than dominant disciplinary standards currently allow. I find a lot of journal articles banal: tightly argued, but on points that I don’t think display much in the way of real philosophical insight.
   Which brings me to my real point: namely, that I think our discipline could use a whole lot more of people deciding for themselves what good philosophy is, and what is second-rate. But how does one do that? Not, I think, by simply conforming to the pre-specified standards of the profession, but rather by challenging them with one’s own well-thought-out ideas of what distinguishes great from second-rate work. But in that case — and again, I think this sort of thing is virtuous — one is very liable to send out work that others will regard as second-rate. So, in a nutshell, I actually think it can be a good and virtuous thing to send out work that others may consider second-rate — not our of laziness or a lack of conscientiousness, but because one has developed one’s own standards through a great deal of thought and reflection. A good and virtuous person owes it to themselves — not to reviewers but fundamentally to themselves — to send out their best work as they see it; and if it’s work that others see as second rate, at least one can look oneself in the mirror knowing that one did work that one is proud of.
   I should probably add that I don’t think I’d have published many of the papers I have — papers I’m proud of, and which I think embody my own (admittedly idiosyncratic) vision of what good philosophy is — if I had followed many of the guidelines you offer.
   First, I’m skeptical of reading too much. I firmly believe what Einstein said: “Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking.” Most of the work I do in Kantian ethics doesn’t engage with the extant literature — and I don’t think it should (given what I’m trying to do with it). I’ve had some reviewers hammer my approach to Kantian ethics as “second rate” for not engaging with the literature enough — but I still think my approach is fundamentally right, and I’ve begun to publish on it (even though, on my approach, mostly ignoring the literature makes sense…for reasons I can’t quite get into here).
   Then there’s your point about sending things to people to read. For my part, I think this is often counterproductive. My approach to philosophy is so anti-conservative that people who read my papers often give me negative feedback: I’m trying to do “too much.” But this feedback fundamentally cuts against my philosophy of philosophy. I think great philosophy should attempt to do “too much” — or, at any rate, I think I do my best work when I do that (whatever anyone else might think). Doing work in private enables me to do philosophy the way I think is right, without other people clouding my mind with their conception of how I should be doing it. Example: I showed my free will paper to no one before sending it out for review, mostly because I thought people would laugh at it. Then, after I got an RnR, I turned it from a 21 page paper into a 78-pager. When I resubmitted it, I got a rather cruel rejection letter excoriating me for having the gall to turn in something 78-pages long. At that point, I showed the 78-pager to a couple of colleagues in the discipline, both of whom told me in no uncertain terms that I absolutely must cut it down to a much more manageable length. Of course I didn’t do that because it seemed to me that the paper needed 78 pages to do what I thought it should do. But the point is this: all of the feedback I got from people was trying to shoehorn the project into what people consider “appropriate” by the standards of the discipline. But I fundamentally care about the work itself, not disciplinary standards. If the discipline thinks the work is second-rate, then that’s their right. But I have the right to do work that I think is first-rate, even if they don’t. Which is just yet another reason why I don’t think I have a duty to avoid submitting “second-rate” articles? (Second-rate to whom? If it’s second-rate to me, I won’t send it out. If it’s second-rate to them, it’s still my right to decide whether it’s second-rate to me!).

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10. Dan Dennis

    May 1, 2013

    Interesting, thanks Marcus.
    I certainly agree that it is extremely valuable to do important, original and ambitious work. And that most stuff in the literature is not important, original and ambitious. And one should not shoehorn one’s papers into a one size fits all straightjacket, or simply submit to others’ expectations. And certainly one needs to spend the majority of one’s time thinking, and must ultimately rely upon one’s own judgement.
    However if one can find someone who is open minded, and perhaps on the same wavelength as oneself who will read one’s work, and show where it is not clear, not well argued, or does not address certain objections, then that can help improve the paper.
    As for the literature, I don’t know what exactly to say. Clearly one should try to do sufficient reading to ensure one can avoid repeating what others have said. And if a particular assumption one relies on is controversial then it can be helpful to show that others make it too. However that said, I am not very good at engaging with the literature myself, but when nearly everyone says it is important to ‘place one’s paper in the conversation’ and ‘relate to other work’ in order to help readers relate to what one is saying to what they have previous read, better understand it and (thus) to increase one’s chances of publication – well I suppose I am reluctantly inclined to believe them…
    Finally, don’t you find that generally if you spend more time on a paper then it gets better – at least for quite a while? In which case, I suppose, the question is how much is sufficient time… Do you keep at it until you cannot improve it more? Or do you send it out when it is just ok, or what…

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