Timeline for Does a referee have to check carefully the proof ?
Current License: CC BY-SA 2.5
9 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 7, 2016 at 16:28 | history | made wiki | Post Made Community Wiki by S. Carnahan♦ | ||
| Jan 27, 2011 at 16:12 | history | edited | Sheikraisinrollbank | CC BY-SA 2.5 |
added 1820 characters in body
|
| Dec 12, 2010 at 19:11 | comment | added | roy smith | If you do have time to check everything, that is a valuable service to everyone. If not, just say so. I have found gaps in arguments by very strong people, usually by citing other famous people erroneously, after months of checking. In a few cases I have told the editor the results were important, the arguments looked careful and thorough but I had not checked them all. It is the editor's job to decide whether to publish or re - referee based on your remarks. The less you check, the sooner you want to finish of course, within reason. | |
| Dec 12, 2010 at 18:13 | comment | added | Thierry Zell | @JBL: I was adding a point about the stuff that I already believed and already believed I knew how to prove. I've run across those a couple of times when I see a lemma and think: "oh, sure, you do X and Y and it'll work out." But neglecting "routine arguments" can make us miss their unexpected depth, a remark that does not have to do much with the good of the refereeing process as to the health of mathematics in general. | |
| Dec 12, 2010 at 0:11 | comment | added | Joël | Completely agree with Thierry (except the first three-words sentence). | |
| Oct 2, 2010 at 10:26 | comment | added | sleepless in beantown | Much of physical science builds upon the results of others. The only ones who will rigorously test and check and validate the results in a particular subtopic, even in mathematics, are those whose interests contain that particular subtopic. Those who would like to apply and extend the results are thus most likely to find the flaws in it. I would guess that this is why referees for a paper should be those who work in the particular subtopic or field of the article being reviewed, and if they're interested in extending those results, they'd scrutinize the article carefully. | |
| Oct 1, 2010 at 19:44 | comment | added | JBL | Thierry, it seems to me that what you are saying is the opposite of what is suggested above: the OP says that he or she scrutinizes the proofs of things he or she believes more. | |
| Oct 1, 2010 at 18:29 | comment | added | Thierry Zell | I don't disagree. However, the danger I see with that approach is the emergence of consensus mathematics. The stuff that looks right does not get scrutinized much, which, even if the results are true, does not nurture progress. All you need is to read the book en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proofs_and_Refutations to realize that an "obvious" result like the Euler characteristic of a polyhedron benefits from intense scrutiny. | |
| Oct 1, 2010 at 9:52 | history | answered | Sheikraisinrollbank | CC BY-SA 2.5 |