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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:right" align="right"><span style lang="EN-US">Buenos Aires, December 8, 2013</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">Dear
Colleagues:<br>
Subject: <i><span style>On the Origin of Academic
Bullshitting</span></i><br style>
<br style>
</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">The real
world is not a nice place lo live in, and I face it by writing satyrical
pieces. However I will let aside the humour genre, and try to describe the problem
as seriously and briefly as I can.<br>
<br>
My metier during 30 years was that of an operarional researcher at industrial
firms. I was not an academic but a practitioner. In the nineties Argentine
economy was hit by ‘neoliberalism’. I lost my job, which forced me to reenter
my alma mater as an assistant professor. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US"><br>
In the math dept they want me to write papers, the publish-or-perish policy
being in force. In fact it serves the purpose to drain off the congestion of
people in the school of sciences. There is no place for a scientist outside the
academy. Hence students, after getting the diploma, try to stay on at the academy
to follow an academic career.<br>
<br>
The procedure is as follows. Once every seven years Dr X has to face a contest
they call "concurso". What it means is that the school posts in the
daily press a call for anyone who feels he is better than X in his field. Let
me call the candidates A and B. Then they proceed to count their papers, mind
you, the number not the content. If X’s number is greater than the maximum of A
and B then he can stay on the following seven years at his job. Otherwise
he is given the sack. There is no such a thing as tenure. The
ordeal recurs until X is either terminated, or retired at 65 or die of a heart
attack.<br>
<br>
Under these circumstances it is clear that making up papers is the foremost
objective of the professor, therefore his strategy is to maximize the number of
published articles in peer-reviewed journals. It follows that his output would
be mainly sophisticated bullshit.<br>
<br>
Something really went wrong in the academy after I got my diploma in 1963, I
don’t recall such a beastly academic policy when I was a student. What was its
cause? When did it happen? Does this academic phenomenon sound familiar to you?
</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">In 2005 I
was lecturing Combinatorial Optimization in the math dept under a contract having
an almost zero stipend. I did it for the fun of it, I enjoyed teaching. The
Computer Science chairman contrived a way to abort my contract. Why, for goodness’
sake? He was displeased because I did consulting jobs for industrial firms while
he had in his dept half a dozen full-time professors commited to OR
paper-making. This academic specimen happened to be an IFORS vice-president. <span style> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">I am under
the impression that numerous scholars are engaged in paper-writing, the theory
of which will never be used to solve a real world problem that benefits society
<span style> </span><span style> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">Sincerely,<br>
<br>
Fabio Vicentini<br>
Operational Research Consultant</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><br><span style lang="EN-US"></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style lang="EN-US">PS. Report sent to 128 colleagues around the world<br></span></p>
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