Talk:Schön scandal

message: The article states:  "Bell Labs fired Schön on the day they received the report. It was one of the most recognized of many cases of fraud in the Labs' history."  I am unaware of "many" cases of fraud at Bell Labs, a particularly eminent scientific and engineering institution.  Deutsche Welle (http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,646321,00.html) quotes Dr. William O'Shea, head of Bell Labs in 2002 in a press release commenting:
"We are deeply saddened that such a case of scientific misconduct should happen in Bell Labs, for the first time in our 77-year history".  Hardly the "many cases of fraud in the Lab's history" cited in this article.
Can whoever added this comment provide sources for this questionable comment - otherwise the word "many" should be removed. Tony (talk) 03:16, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comment r.e. cases of fraud at Bell Labs 

message: after reading that his Ph.D. was yanked in 2004, is there any web article that mentions what happened to him.  where did he end up?  what does he now do for a living? r b-j 07:13, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: According to Science (April 7th 2006 issue) his whereabouts are unknown. Lylum 23:02, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Where is Jan Hendrik Schön today? 

message: Several sentences (almost entire paragraphs) in this article are taken directly from Dan Agin's book Junk Science. rvilbig December 27, 2006 at 05:57:33 (UTC)
:Are you sure it's not the other way around?  According to Amazon, that book was published on October 3, 2006 .  Comparing the present version of the article to the September 20th 2006 (the last one before the book came out), there have been only a few minor changes (punctuation etc.), no new sentences or paragraphs.  In fact the last big addition was in June 2006 (a list of withdrawn journal papers), and before that, a couple sentences were added on April 20, 2006.  I don't count some nonsense vandalism from 11 November removed a few minutes later.  Can you find the specific edits to the article that contain sentences similar to the book?  Thanks. 67.117.130.181 16:14, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Has anyone who has this book able to verify if Dan Agin has attributed wikipedia?  Or if this book was published in another form before October 2006?  SFC9394 18:46, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

text: After all this time, I have finally added the Agin book as a reference, and used it.  I have tried to reword some things and make the attribution as specific as possible, but I have no doubt that legally speaking this is still a copyright violation. Looie496 (talk) 23:43, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Plagiarized sentences 

message: I am not very familiar with the case, nor with his topic. However, as I started my PhD in Germany in Oct 2002 it was impossible not to hear about it; it was obviously big news then. 
One sentence in the article strikes me as a bit naive:
"The report found that all of the misdeeds had been performed by Schön alone. All the coauthors were completely exonerated of scientific misconduct. It was, however, unclear whether all of them had exercised sufficient professional responsibility in trusting the integrity of his data."
Seems to me hard to believe that people working closely with him and providing supervisor role failed to spot what scientists from outside saw as bogus. Rumor has it that his real supervisor (the name eludes me) quitly moved to Switzerland and accepted a position there right before the scandal. Is that true?
One more word about this affair: It's a bit disappointing that after 6 years the scientific community still doesn't care to learn all the lessons there are to be learned from such a case. 
When you are "encouraged" to publish as much as certain institution do, or, better, when you sign contracts stipulating that you should generate a ridiculous number of papers per year, is that impossible to imagine that certain PhD students will work late at night all by themselves, if you know what I mean?
When the common lore is that you should have at least 5-10 publications by the time you finish your PhD to stand a chance, when the emphasis is on quantity rather than quality, what do you expect? 
It's scary indeed to think how many bogus papers are generated each year... Schon wasn't the only case, he's just one of the few who probably became so confidant in his scam that he abused the system, that's all... 81.96.124.212 (talk) 17:42, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That was the finding of the report and that's how it's reported. In physics papers often have many authors who have just provided some of the data or worked on some of the experiments, so I can see how this is possible. And you tend to trust your co-authors - you don't expect them to be deliberately defrauding the scientific community in this way. I agree with some of your paper-mill points, but this isn't a forum (wp:talk). Anyone who coauthored with this guy is tarnished now, so they haven't got away with anything. Verbal chat 14:48, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  How much was he a perpetrator and how much a victim? 

message: The paragraph about University of Konstanz stripping Schön of his degree and Schön's subsequent appeal made no sense since SesquipedalianVerbiage's edit. The University's decision was an act of public administration. If such acts are accompanied by advice on applicable legal remedies, one has four weeks to appeal (this period is also noted in the University's press release). If a decision is appealed, it is not effectual until a final decision is made. In other terms, the revocation of Schön's degree was deferred by Schön's appeal. The scenario "Schön appeals the decision within four weeks but stays stripped of his degree until a final decision is reached" is not possible. As a sidenote: this is also why the statement "PhD withdrawn [...] now under appeal" given on p12 in a 2007 presentation on scientific misconduct by Philip Campbell, editor-in-chief of Nature, describes a scenario that is impossible. Campbell obviously relied on the Wikipedia entry and didn't quite understand it.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.211.136.139 (talk) 10:07, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If you could back this up with RS it'd be much better, thanks. Verbal chat 10:30, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  To my knowledge, there is no publicly available RS for "and used that possibility to adjourn the revocation. As of July 2007 a final decision is still pending." JHS never talked to the press about anything, and unsurprisingly, the University didn't issue another press release after the appeal. If anybody feels like editing the paragraph on grounds of lacking RS - please just delete the cited sentence, and at least the rest will still be correct as it doesn't state whether or not the degree was actually revoked or not.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.180.66.145 (talk) 22:10, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  But we have multiple RS for the revocation - whether you think it is true or not. We go on verifiability here, not "the truth". Verbal chat 07:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Define "multiple" - as in any source independent from the University's press release.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.180.72.163 (talk) 09:20, 1 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Newspapers, news and editorials in scientific publications, and the talks you referred to above. It doesn't matter if these are all derived from the press release or "impossible scenarios" in your opinion, that is irrelevant. Unless it's something that is obviously wrong or is disputed by other RS, we go with what is in the verifiable and reliable sources. Verbal chat 09:23, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  PS: Since you seem to be on a dynamic IP, it might be of benefit for you to get an account. See the link for good reasons. Verbal chat 09:34, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

text:  I think the section now is a fair compromise. However, your reasoning strikes me as odd. 1) How can it not be relevant if different accounts of the situation all stem from the same one source? To determine the amount of support for a claim should be done differently than PageRank-like counting of references to the claim. If A states "X", and B, C, and D then report "A stated 'X' ", "X" itself is no more well-founded than before. 2) How can it not be relevant if a claim describes a situation that is impossible? Claims about impossible scenarios need no empirical testing since they have to be false. If I claim to know a real symmetric positive-definite matrix with a negative eigenvalue, then you can dismiss this claim a-priori on grounds of impossibilty without asking me for the specific matrix first. 3) The claim that JHS appealed the decision is no less a rumor than the claim that his appeal adjourned the revocation of his degree. Why delete the latter but not the former? However, since the appeal-part is tagged as in need of RS - fair enough.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.180.65.97 (talk) 22:13, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Because we don't know if they are derived from the same source. We have no RS that the situation is impossible, just your opinion. Do you have a WP:COI here? Verbal chat 07:45, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

text:  You're a moving target. On Sep 03, you stated that, quote, "It doesn't matter if these are all derived from the press release or 'impossible scenarios' in your opinion, that is irrelevant." Now, you retract to the much weaker position 'we don't know whether a) they're from the same source, and whether b) that scenario is impossible'. Ad a) It's debatable who has the burden of proof here. You claim that there is multiple RS for the degree currently being revoked. IMHO, it's you who you should provide evidence for 'multiple' in the sense of 'independent from the press release' - which was issued before the appeal-period expired. It's you because, heuristically, there are only two independent sources conceivable: the University, and JHS since they're the only two parties involved. Ad b) That's not my opinion, it's the law. c) I've yet to see RS for the claim that JHS appealed the decision. Surely there is such a source that dates before the Wikipedia edit. d) I see no reason for any attempt like yours to discredit my argumentation by speculating about a conflict of interest.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.184.128.69 (talk) 19:08, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

text: The german version of this article states that the university tried to revoke his PhD but couldn't.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.30.234.150 (talk) 16:44, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  What is their reference for that? Verbal chat 16:55, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  There was none until a few weeks ago, as I discussed with you earlier on this page. Now, however, the University of Konstanz came to a decision with regards to Schön's appeal - it was rejected after being checked for five years. This decision can again be contested, and, in that case, will go to court. So far, everything was on the level of the university. Press release University of Konstanz, News coverage: Der Spiegel  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.229.103.11 (talk) 21:10, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  He indeed went to court and won the case. The University can still try to appeal the decision and take it to a higher court. News coverage about the trial Press release University of Kontanz  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.79.237.11 (talk) 18:01, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  In November 2010 the University moved to appeal. Press release University of Kontanz.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.187.11.10 (talk) 10:49, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Revocation of his degree 

message: I'm doing some work to get the sources in order here.  As a step, I've converted the article to use short notes and Wikilinks, which are much easier to use and maintain. Looie496 (talk) 22:07, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Sources

message: The article purports to be a biography about Jan Hendrik Schön, but in fact it has almost zero biographical content. It's actually an article about a certain point in time in his life, with little information prior, and non after. I suggest that this article be re-titled to clearly reflect what it's actually about, which would also remove it from having to meet BIO. Maury Markowitz (talk) 12:28, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It would still have to meet WP:BLP in anything about a living person. If you know of RS that can extend the biographical content of this article, then please list them here. The article contains basic biographical information at least, at details the events that made Schön notable. Verbal chat 13:21, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Not if it was not a biographical article. Consider the Sokal affair article, for instance, which I think would be a more natural form for this article. Maury Markowitz (talk) 17:42, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

text: I tend to agree with the learned Maury...this is a disgrace to all scientists and the article, while excellent, is NOT a biography! If it cannot contain basic biographical data, it must be treated as something else. I agree that something like "The Schon Scandal" is on target. Besides, Schon barely deserves a biography anyway!76.195.85.164 (talk) 18:08, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should this not be called "Schön scandal" or "Schön affair"? 

message: May one ask, why is there no reference to Moores' Law here? In the Schon Scandal, at least Schon proved Moore's Law to be holding fast for now. It had been thought, if Schon had been correct, that Moore's Law was shattered. I think it is necessary to note that Schon was thought to have shattered Moore's Law back when he was believed.76.195.85.164 (talk) 18:09, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Moore's Law 

message: I've read some of the books here and they are top notch.  Exactly what you would want in this section.  The Rich book especially.  If the tagger would care to say that he has read the books and can discuss what's in them versus what's needed, then perhaps he can make a case for the tag.  TCO (talk) 04:19, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  removing tag on further reading 

message: From what I can see, the two researchers who originally tipped off the world, namely Julia Hsu and Lynn Loo, are unmentioned in this article.
Cf. Science 2.0:  "... two fellow physicists, Julia Hsu and Lynn Loo, attempted to patent research showing that soft lithography could be used to make softer and gentler contact with organic molecules and they used Schön's paper as validation of how cutting-edge their experimental progress was; that's when they stumbled across duplicated data and sounded the alarm. "
In the wikipedia article the discovery of the duplicated plots is credited to Lydia Sohn.  I believe that is not correct.  It is Lynn Loo who discovered this -- and news was passed on to McEuen and Sohn.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.17.71.110 (talk) 16:54, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible Oversight 

message: :Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *Support or *Oppose, then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.
*Oppose if he is independently notable from the scandal that he caused, then maybe, but he is only notable for the fraudulent activities that lead to the scandal, and the scandal itself, so WP:1E; even if he were independently notable, the scandal itself should be separate from his biography in that case, not as part of it, since this article is mostly concerning the scandal and its background, it is clear that such a subject can stand on its own, without being shoehorned into a biography article. In any case, it would unbalance such an article unless drastically cut down in content were this to be renamed, thus leading to creation of a subarticle on the scandal, leading us back to having this article exist, whether or not the biography article exists.-- 65.94.171.126 (talk) 06:40, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see the creation of a subarticle necessary at all. From a renaming, that is. There are hundreds of Wikipedia articles about "one-event persons" (biography of which only a single event meets notability) that use those person's actual name as lemma, from Emily Davison over Louise Brown to John Wilkes Booth. --bender235 (talk) 18:53, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Survey

message: I (Don Monroe) am the fifth author on the Bell Labs Report (reference 5). For some reason my name is left off of the author list. I hope someone will add me to the list, since I know there is sensitivity about editing things about yourself. Donmon1 (talk) 22:49, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the head's up.  There is a D. Monroe missing listed as a committee member in the document, so I added the name to the reference.  a13ean (talk) 20:08, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Missing coauthor

message: Posting here in hopes of more visibility. The Chinese entry is translated from the English version, and somehow has an issue being added as a language link. There is an error when attempting to associate the page in wikidata and I'm not sure how to resolve it. ZigZagZoug (talk) 04:27, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. But it is weird since all the other wikis are titles Jan Hendrik Schön, and only en and zh are titled Schön scandal. — XComhghall (talk) 12:18, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Language link issue with Schon scandal? 

message: :The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 
The result of the move request was: no consensus. As  points out, moving the article would most likely constitute a violation of the "cover the event, not the person" rule from WP:BIO1E. Sure, we're utilising a convenient fiction with doing so as a way to also cover the inherently linked person, but Tamzin's argument is enough to entrench the discussion (which has a slight but, as far as RMs go, historically not strong enough WP:NOTVOTEnot-vote majority in favour of moving) firmly in the realm no consensus. (closed by non-admin page mover) Sceptre (talk) 17:40, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Schön scandal →  – Restore original title of article.  This article was moved to "Schön scandal" without discussion in 2010 on WP:BLP1E grounds, and probably should have been moved back after a no consensus RM in 2014 on procedural grounds.  Regardless, it should be moved back anyway on the merits.  BLP1E doesn't apply: there are three conditions that each must be met.  Schön was covered in relation to his scientific work before fraud happened (criterion 1), this was not a low-profile individual, this was an individual appearing in mainstream magazine articles and winning awards (criterion 2), and the related fraud events was very significant and Schön's role is well-documented, so he's not an incidental figure (e.g. a murder victim notable for nothing else), criterion 3.  Again, each of those should be met for BLP1E to really apply, but arguably only half of a single criterion is met (criteria 1, maybe).  Finally, sometimes a title like this gets used to "spread blame" when there's a scandal with a ringleader but the article also covers the actions of collaborators in detail too.  However, per the article, "All of the coauthors (including Bertram Batlogg, who was the head of the team) were exonerated of scientific misconduct."  So no, this article really does focus on Schön. Of course, the system bears blame too, but that doesn't change that we have biography articles on similar academic hoaxers by name (e.g. Diederik Stapel) for whom The System failed too, and this article is the odd one out. SnowFire (talk) 06:07, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Requested move 31 January 2022 

message: I’m sorry, in the Sanctions section, his only sanctions were he was “‘’deprived of his right to vote in DFG elections’’“ and receive further grants?  That’s all???  I can’t believe this guy wasn’t booted out of every scientific society in Germany and America. There weren’t any additional consequences? --ChetvornoTALK 21:57, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I mean, his Ph.D. was rescinded; irrespective of his fraud etc, he spent the time and did the work to earn the Ph.D., and now no longer has the privilege of claiming it because of his actions. Something for which he probably worked very hard is now taken away from him. As far as sanctions go, I'd say that's probably the severest!  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.109.192.96 (talk) 16:59, 10 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Really?