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  • 1.  Article: "A Long-Sought Proof, Found and Almost Lost"

    Posted 03-28-2017 12:05
    Edited by Lara Harmon 03-28-2017 12:05
    Hello, all!

    I was scrolling through Twitter today, and saw someone sharing this article, from Quanta magazine:

    "A Long-Sought Proof, Found and Almost Lost" <https://www.quantamagazine.org/20170328-statistician-proves-gaussian-correlation-inequality>

    The article talks about a retired German statistician's discovery of the proof of the Gaussian correlation inequality (GCI), and why his discovery wasn't...well, discovered for years after he had formulated it.

    As a layperson, I can't comment on the proof itself, but, after reading the article, I thought it brought up a lot of interesting points that high school students and undergrads might find accessible: questions about what being published means, about where and how you should be published, about professional goals and expectations and personal satisfaction, about international scientific/analytic communication, about different goals at different points in a career (starting out and retirement, for instance)... Though these aren't technically stats issues, they help tell a story that can interest laypeople (or newbies!) and that could get conversation going.

    What do you think?

    (As always, no endorsement implied! Just an article I personally read and found interesting.)

    - Lara

    ------------------------------
    Lara Harmon
    Marketing and Online Community Coordinator
    American Statistical Association
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  • 2.  RE: Article: "A Long-Sought Proof, Found and Almost Lost"

    Posted 03-29-2017 13:34
    Lara,
    Thanks for that interesting read.
    I think that your suggestion that a message about publication could be made for high school and undergrad students holds for all of us at any stage of our careers. 

    Many years ago I received my first rejection letter from a journal; it may have been my first submission. 
    I was devastated. One of my professors told me that it may be a good paper, just the wrong journal at the wrong time, with the wrong referee. He told me about his much-cited article which was initially rejected. He submitted it with minimal revisions to a different journal soon after and it quickly accepted and published. Perhaps my paper didn't deserve publication, or maybe it was published elsewhere later, but regardless, his comments helped me through the disappointment and discouragement. I never took a rejection letter so personally after that, and I have had a few.

    There is also a message about timing. I have several research papers I started about 20 years ago. I hit a snag or got busy with something else and put them aside and never completed them. In the old days, we did research on paper and I have some files of "old research", and some electronically. I tried to clean them up and found that some had been subsequently published by someone else.

    Thanks again,
    David

    --
    David R. Bristol, PhD
    President, Statistical Consulting Services, Inc.
    1-336-293-7771



    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: Article: "A Long-Sought Proof, Found and Almost Lost"

    Posted 03-30-2017 11:38
    Hello, David!

    I'm glad the article was interesting to you. And I agree 100%--remembering that a rejection isn't 'the end' is always useful, no matter where in a career (or life) one might be. Anyone I know who creates work, whether artistic or analytical or a combination thereof, has to live with many more rejections than acceptances. It's definitely a skill that requires practice, learning to move forward from each rejection.

    - Lara

    ------------------------------
    Lara Harmon
    Marketing and Online Community Coordinator
    American Statistical Association
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


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