What’s Impact? Whose Specialty?

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I gave a webinar presentation yesterday for ASERL. It was recorded and can be viewed here.

Here’s the abstract:

What’s ‘Impact’? Whose Speciality? J. Britt Holbrook, Visiting Assistant Professor in the School of Public Policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology, discusses his research on developing indicators for the impact of scholarly communication. Holbrook argues that, although libraries, librarians, and information scientists can play a useful role in developing such indicators, there are inherent risks in too much standardization. Our common goal should be to develop impact indicators that maximize the creativity and freedom of individuals to conduct excellent research.

Comments welcome, of course.

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

Cryolophosaurus by Brad McFeeters (vectorized by T. Michael Keesey)

Apparently NSF Grant Applicants Still Allergic To Broader Impacts

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David Bruggeman's avatarPasco Phronesis

The Consortium of Social Science Associations held its Annual Colloquium on Social And Behavioral Sciences and Public Policy earlier this week.  Amongst the speakers was Acting National Science Foundation (NSF) Director Cora Marrett.* As part of her remarks, she addressed how the Foundation was implementing the Coburn Amendment, which added additional criteria to funding political science research projects through NSF.

The first batch of reviews subject to these new requirements tookplace in early 2013.  In addition to the usual criteria of intellectual merit and broader impacts, the reviewers looked at the ‘most meritorious’ proposals and examined how they contribute to economic development and/or national security.  For the reviews scheduled for early 2014, all three ‘criteria’ will be reviewed at once.

Since researchers don’t like to be told what to do, they aren’t happy.  But Marrett asserts through her remarks that this additional review will not really affect the…

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‘Big Data’ Is Bunk, Obama Campaign’s Tech Guru Tells University Leaders – Wired Campus – The Chronicle of Higher Education

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“The ‘big’ there is purely marketing,” Mr. Reed said. “This is all fear … This is about you buying big expensive servers and whatnot.”

via 'Big Data' Is Bunk, Obama Campaign's Tech Guru Tells University Leaders – Wired Campus – The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Also funny what he says about his own education ….

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

Cetacea by Scott Hartman

Me on the Web, According to ImpactStory.org and Altmetric.com

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Impact Story is one of the two altmetrics tools that allow individual researchers to find out something about the social media buzz surrounding their activities; the other is Altmetric.com. Although other developers exist, I can’t seem to figure out how I, as an individual, can use their tools (I’m looking at you, Plum Analytics).

There are a few major differences between Impact Story and Altmetric.com from a user standpoint. First, Impact Story is not for profit, while Altmetric.com is a business. Second, Impact Story steers one to create a collection of products that together tell a story of one’s impact. Altmetric.com, on the other hand, steers one to generate figures for the impact of individual products. Third, Impact Story allows for a range of products, including those tagged with URLs as well as DOIs; Altmetric.com only works with DOIs. This means that Impact Story can gather info on things like blog posts, while Altmetric.com is focused on scholarly articles. Finally, and this is a big difference, Impact Story deemphasizes numbers, while Atlmetric.com assigns a number, the Altmetric score, to each product.

Here is my latest Impact Story.

Here is one of my products according to Altmetric; here’s another; and another.

It’s interesting to see how Impact Story and Altmetric differ, both in their approaches and in terms of what they find on the same products.

I think the implications of these tools are enormous. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts!

Right and left are fading away in politics – Steve Fuller – Aeon

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Right and left are fading away in politics – Steve Fuller – Aeon.

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

Bonnerichthys by Gareth Monger

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

PhyloPic Phryday Photo

Monograptus turriculatus by DW Bapst (Modified from Bulman, 1964).

Fuller’s Categorical Imperative: The Will to Proaction, J. Britt Holbrook

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SERRC's avatarSocial Epistemology Review and Reply Collective

Author Information: J. Britt Holbrook, Georgia Institute of Technology, britt.holbrook@pubpolicy.gatech.edu

Holbrook, J. Britt. 2013.”Fuller’s Categorical Imperative: The Will to Proaction.” Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 2 (11): 20-26.

The PDF of the article gives specific page numbers. Shortlink: http://wp.me/p1Bfg0-13K

“I love those who do not know how to live, except by going under, for they are those who cross over.” — Nietzsche

Abstract

Two 19th century philosophers — William James and Friedrich Nietzsche — and one on the border of the 18th and 19th centuries — Immanuel Kant — underlie Fuller’s support for the proactionary imperative as a guide to life in ‘Humanity 2.0’. I make reference to the thought of these thinkers (James’s will to believe, Nietzsche’s will to power, and Kant’s categorical imperative) in my critique of Fuller’s will to proaction. First, I argue that, despite a superficial resemblance, James’s view about the risk of uncertainty does not map well onto the proactionary principle. Second…

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