分享1篇science上很好的文章，文章主题：论文的生命力：论以期刊影响力衡量文章价值的不合理性 。
Sci. Signal., 1 December 2009 Vol. 2, Issue 99, p. eg15
《科学.信号》2009年12月1日第2卷99期
http://stke.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sigtrans;2/99/eg15
Living by the Numbers
数字生活
Michael B. Yaffe1,2*
1 Chief Scientific Editor of Science Signaling, American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1200 New York Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20005, USA.
2 Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Departments of Biology and Biological Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
1美国华盛顿区20005纽约NW大街1200号，美国先进科***合会《科学信号》科学总编辑
2美国MA02139，剑桥麻省理工学院生物和生物工程部整体癌症研究科赫研究所
Abstract: Quantitation of an article's worth by the impact of the journal in which it appears is a path to undermining scientific enterprise. Through a process analogous to rating medical care, rating journals can lead to loss of research effort in the most challenging questions. A paper should be evaluated on its own impact, not by some arbitrary score for the journal as a whole.
摘要：出现通过期刊的影响来衡量文章价值，是一种损害科学事业的方法。尽管该过程类似于评估医疗护理，评估杂志会导致在大多数挑战性问题的研究努力的丧失，一篇论文应该以它自身的影响被评估，而不是与出版它的期刊成为一个整体被一些***的评分而评估，
As scientists, we tend to measure and quantify everything. Until recently, I would have argued that there was probably nothing that couldn’t be, or shouldn’t be, measured. Two examples of "numbers gone crazy" in medicine and science, have changed my mind.
作为一个科学家我们试图测量和衡量每个东西，到最近为止，我不得不为可能应该被评估的东西是怎么回事而争论。两个发生在医学和科学界“疯狂数字”的例子，使我改变主意
First is the mismeasure of medicine. There is an increasing tendency of legislators, third-party payers, and patients to assign some sort of quality ranking numbers to their doctor, surgeon, or local hospital. What could be wrong with that? After all, isn’t everyone entitled to know how good someone or some place is? Isn’t everyone entitled to the best care from the best people? Unfortunately, what looks so right at first glance turns out to be horribly wrong over the long term. This process is fundamentally destabilizing. As everyone rushes to the "best" doctor and the "best" hospital, the system bifurcates into a tiny group of highly skilled but heavily overworked and overburdened professionals, and a much larger group of largely competent folks who, deprived of patients, now have essentially no opportunity to improve. As legislators and insurers continue to reward "the best" and penalizing "the rest," there becomes increasing pressure to maintain or attain elite status. Consequently, patients likely to do poorly are refused care, and there becomes an increasing reluctance to report bad outcomes. In the end, the whole system collapses, taking good patient care down with it.
第一个例子是医学的误测量，立法者、第三方投资者和患者采用某种等级数字去评价医生、外科医生和当地医院的现象存在增长趋势。那么它的弊端呢？是不是每个人都有资格知道某人或某地究竟好不好？是不是每个人都有资格从最优秀的人那里得到最好的服务？不幸的是，第一眼被看作是正确的，在长远看来是相当糟糕的。这个过程从根本上看来是不稳定的，每个人都奔向最好的医生和最好的医院，医疗体系被分为两部分，一小部分医生高技能而过劳、过重负担，而大量有足够能力的普通医生缺乏病人，目前尤其没机会去改善，立法者和保险公司继续奖赏那些最好的，惩罚其余的将会增加普通大众和精英的压力，导致穷病人被拒绝服务，而且报告不良后果越来越不愿意被呈报，最终伴随良好病人服务的崩溃，整个体系崩溃。
This same process, which I argue is on its way to destroying health care, has also been happening in science. The mis-measure here is the "Impact Factor," a "score" established by Thomson ISI for reporting the frequency with which the "average article" in a journal has been cited in a given period of time. Because Science Signaling is less than 2 years old, the journal does yet have an "Impact Factor." Consequently, I have the freedom to complain about these types of measurements without being accused of "sour grapes."
与医疗健康体系被毁坏的同时科学体系也被损害，发生在科学界的错误措施是“影响因子”，由依据一段特定时期一份期刊的平均文章引用率建立起报道频率构建的Thomson ISI系统确立了一套测量方法。因为科学信号创刊时间少于两年，期刊仍有影响因子，因此，我有抱怨这些评价方法的自由，而不被指责为“酸葡萄心理”
Twenty-five years ago, when I was a graduate student, it seemed like everyone had a pretty clear sense of which journals published what kind of papers. If the work was just overflowing with cool findings, it ended up in Science or Nature. Cell was also known for publishing spectacular findings, depending on geography. PNAS was where you went to get great ideas, because the papers were fascinating but short and often presented only the beginning of the story. If you wanted to get all of the gory details about an experimental system, you read a society journal like Journal of Biological Chemistry (JBC), Biochemical Journal, or Journal of Cell Biology. Now, as journals compete for the highest impact factor, it seems that most journals are trying to publish the identical types of papers, overflowing with cool results, completely self-consistent data, and mind-boggling findings.
25年前当我还是一个研究生，当时每个人都明白什么样的杂志出版什么样的论文，如果文章都是数量泛滥而鲜有惊人发现，以发表惊人发现和依赖于地理的自然、科学、细胞而知名的期刊将停刊， 因为论文吸引人而简练，通常只给详情的开头，阅读PNAS你会得到高见。如果整个实验的细节，你应该读一些社会刊物如生物化学（JBC）生物化学杂志、细胞生物杂志。现在一本杂志为有最高的影响因子而竞争大部分杂志出版同样类型的论文充斥着单调的结果，完全前后一致的数据和惊人的发现
Even worse, it seems that some universities and research institutions are now using the "Impact Factor" of the journals where a scientist publishes to decide on the size of start-up packages or whether someone will be promoted. These institutions would do well to remember that the original discovery of B cells as the source of antibodies was published in Poultry Science, and that the discovery that PTEN (one of the most important tumor suppressor genes) was a phosphatase for phosphoinositol-phosphate lipids was published in JBC. Why not just judge a paper by the net impact of the work itself, instead of by some arbitrary score for the journal as a whole? Perhaps the silliest aspect of this whole "Impact Factor–centric" approach lies with the potentially wide availability of scientific papers via the Internet. Work that might previously have been missed if one had to read print journals in the library should no longer be at the same disadvantage. Perhaps institutions feeling financial pressure only subscribe to the "high impact" journals, like the legislators and insurers who only want to pay the top doctors and hospitals. Then, just like those who refuse to care for the sickest patients, no one will want to work on the really hard problems that can’t guarantee a fast paper in a high-profile journal. The pressure to maintain "high impact" status will further lead to selective data presentation, self-deception, or worse, because truth, in the process of discovery, is often confusingly complex and not always completely consistent. In the end, the real loser here will be science itself, which despite its high impact factor, will have little, if any, real impact. If we continue to live by the numbers, then we had better be prepared to fall by them.
更糟糕的是看起来现在一些大学、研究机构正在用用科学家出版杂志的影响因子来决定给多大规模的启动项目，资金或者这个科学家是否被提升，这些研究机构最好应该记得发表于Poultry Science的B细胞作为一种抗体来源被发现，发表于JBC的PTEN（一种重要的肿瘤抑制基因）的作为磷酸肌醇磷酸酯的磷酸酶发现。为什么不能以这项工作本身的净影响来评价一篇论文，取代把杂志作为一个整体用一些***的评分来评价。可能整个核心影响因子的方法最荒谬的方面在于得靠通过网络潜在的广泛获得科学论文来承担。如果人们只读图书馆的纸质出版物，那么一些文章可能被错过，现在不会再有这样的窘境。可能研究机构存在财务压力，只能投高影响力的期刊，就像立法者和保险机构只想给顶尖医生和医疗机构付账。然而就像顶尖医疗机构和医生拒绝为病得最严重的病人服务，没人想解决不能保证著名杂志快速发表论文的真正困难问题。因为真相在发现过程中经常弄混复杂的事物，而且其前后并不总是完全一致，保持高影响地位的压力将使杂志进一步选择性的发表信息，自欺欺人或更糟。最终，真正的失败者是科学自己，尽管有高的影响因子却基本没有或没有真正的影响，如果我们继续依赖数字生活，我们最好准备着因数字而崩溃。
