 Hello everybody, welcome to the correct debate on slow science versus fast science. It is a real pleasure to hold this long awaited appointment, which we hope is of interest to a large portion of the scientific community. And while our original plan was to involve the audience in smaller group discussions we have opted for a classic panel discussion, hoping to run more interactive versions of this event in DSTCON possibly in person in case it's successful. And the motivation of this debate stands from the experience of many early career scientists. Many of us struggle to find our path in the current academic system and the current implicit fast science paradigm is pushing us to quickly write papers, proposals, job applications at a pace that often clashes with other needs. For example, the need to follow the pace of a scientific procedure to better reflect on the significance of our data. Or the need to keep up with the newest literature. Or again, more practically the need to settle in a new city or country every few years and to care for our personal life and that of other people perhaps. So these issues may also affect senior researchers. However, undeniably, it is at the level of early careers competition that they cause a harsh selection on all of us. And therefore, a question spontaneously comes to mind. What kind of scientist should the system reward. Perhaps scientists with the highest age index, or the most brilliant minds, those who are best at communicating, or a healthy compromise of all these qualities or should we rethink the parameters that we are basing our decisions on. The slow sign manifesto defines a movement that was born in response to the current publisher perish fast science paradigm. Slow scientists tend for somewhat old fashioned idea of the academic system, if you may, where scientific curiosity is the important driver of research. Slow scientists protest against deadlines and constant publicity on social media. This is also long for more room to move backwards and sideways, while the long term path of research advances slowly and incrementally. Now, the radical and visionary ideas of this manifesto are yet to be widely discussed and put into practice. Nevertheless, a confirmation that a substantial portion of the community perceives the current system as problematic. But a few of the slow science ideas can already be found in recent examples. I'm going to mention a few in the UK several institutions have started evaluating the impact of researchers beyond the mere journal matrix, and they are rethinking the way impact is is perceived. And also calculated. All funding agencies have abandoned impact factors as a metric to evaluate applicants. For example, the DFG in Germany, the SNF in Switzerland and I'm sure many others that I don't know of some job advertisements, ask directly candidates to send their best publications together with the with the rest of the documents, which suggests that search committees started reading papers, rather than only the numbers of the impact factor and age indices. And I came across this yesterday actually the, the former head of the ERC had gone about me said we need to have the number of scientific publications over the next 10 years in order to increase the quality according. This is a quotation. The peer review system is on the verge of collapse worldwide because it can no longer adequately process the abundance of publications. So, all these things, all these examples that I made and I'm sure there are more are giving a good picture of what is the situation. Perhaps not according to everyone, but a portion of the community is agreeing that there is a problem. Do these examples, these citations, these, these applications of the scientific of the slow science manifesto, are these the way to go, or how far should we keep on changing and revolutionizing the scientific system. To address this topic, we got a four speakers today on our panel. And we decided to cover different backgrounds and career stages. Professor Whitney Bear, who has been chair of structural geology and tectonic group in the Geological Institute of the et age to since summer 2017. Whitney completed her bachelor's degree at California State University Northridge in 26. And her PhD at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles in 2011. She spent 11 months at Brown University as a postdoctoral fellow in the geophysics research group. Prior to arriving at et age from 2012 to 2018 Whitney was an assistant professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at the Jackson School of Geosciences at the University of Texas at Austin. This research incorporates a variety of field analytical and experimental techniques, all aimed toward understanding the formation in both active and ancient plate wash margins. Then we have Valeria Chigala. Dr Valeria Chigala comes from Italy. Her PhD, she got it at LMU Munich in Germany in 2017. For one year she's been back at LMU Munich as a postdoc, and she's non-tenured. Valeria is single and has been the ECS representative of the Natural Arts Division for the past couple of years. Next we have Stuart Lane, Professor Stuart Lane, who held tenure positions, variously at the universities of Cambridge, Leeds and Durham in the UK since completing a PhD in 1994. Since 2001 has been at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. And he is deeply concerned that academic has lost its way in embracing a system grounded in neoliberal thinking that undermines the very essence of what it is to be truly scientific. Allowing the world to speak back, to challenge how we are studying it, is the essence of being scientific, he says. This takes time, however pressing the questions are the art that motivates what we do. Lastly, but not least, we have Professor Dörte Tetzloff. She got her PhD in Germany in 2004, then moved to Scotland on a postdoc fellowship. She became tenure there. First the lectureship, reader and then a full professorship at the University of Aberdeen. She moved back to Germany in 2017. One joint position as a full professor and head of the department in a research institute. She's also editor in chief for hydrological processes. She is the very few female editors and chief in the water resource area. She's married with one nine year old child. So now that I introduced the background of our speakers, we have asked them to prepare a two minutes pitch each where they define the stance with respect to the slow science manifesto. So I welcome Professor Whitney Bear. Okay, thank you Andrea for that introduction and also thanks for organizing this session I think this is a great topic for us to discuss openly. So in terms of my view on the slow science manifesto I'll start with a point of agreement which I think is a major one related to taking the time to think and to absorb and not rushing to publish as soon as we have a result. I agree strongly that we, we need time to develop our ideas. We need to cultivate them into impactful contributions we need to obtain feedback through open discussions and we need to have time to explore further the implications of our work for concepts processes, localities that might be beyond the immediate focus of our research topic. So this properly takes time and resources and therefore it should naturally limit the number of publications that we can physically put out for year if all of our papers are adhering to the same high quality standard, particularly if you're in a field based or or experimental disciplines. I think I'm overall pretty supportive of the aspects of the slow science manifesto that encourage diligence in collecting, interpreting and publishing results. I guess one point of disagreement was that the slow science manifesto as it's written seems to undermine, or at least downplay the importance of various forms of science communication, especially via social media. I think there's a lot of value to these informal science communication venues Twitter, for example, for the primary reason that they attempt to connect the science itself to the scientists that conducted. In other words, it emphasizes the more human aspects of scientific pursuit. It goes a long way to extracting the scientists from their ivory tower and requesting that they engage at a level that non scientists or scientists from other disciplines can understand. And I think the requirement or encouragement from any journals recently to include a plain language summary, along with a technical abstract is also along similar lines. But with something that I got the impression the slow science manifesto kind of devalues. I also really think these informal more public facing less technical mechanisms of outreach have a greater chance of reaching people who are not already in the science sphere who are up in a science, sort of background and therefore it has the potential to help diversify our science. So I guess I disagree with the manifesto on some of the statements regarding how we might engage with the public and with the general concept that advocates we should preserve an ivory tower like existence where we kind of sit around and think and separate ourselves from the public, which are the people who support us financially. Thank you very much. Next up is Valeria Cialla. Yeah, thank you. And thank you Whitney very, very nice insights. And I mostly agree with what Whitney has just said and I'll start by saying, I generally dislike the publish and perish motto, it's something that makes me really think that science and knowledge is something that we can trade at the stock market. And I really think it is value, everything that we do more than just research, but at the same time. I read the manifesto and of this low science, which I agree it strives to give us the research back to what is meaningful like to do research in a meaningful way without caring about all the indexes, basically, but at the same time, I'd like when the motto says we are scientists we don't block we don't Twitter, we take our time and I was like, well, I work as a scientist but I do blog, I do tweet, and I do like this side of the job. And I think it's important. But still I try to take my time. And indeed, I do realize that I don't have it. I don't have enough sometimes to do to do everything. And so, I'm asking so when when, possibly I'm the least or like the earliest career scientist on today's panel. And I know that I'm asked to do more than research when I'm evaluated, but at the same time I find. So I've been experiencing both both sides, both sides so I've been evaluated very positively despite maybe my short list of publication. This is for example from from the UK. I'm always able to get my own proposal basically right after my PhD funded, but I've seen also like say I'm not being given an extension of contract at times because I don't publish enough. And therefore, I'm, I have a lot of questions today and like, do we do we somehow have to have a more standardized evaluation process that somehow cut off the subjectivity, or who is evaluating us and what personally they are expecting from us. So should we maybe redefine more clearly with the job task of a scientist are, and if they if there is, if there are tasks that fall off the job. Yeah, the more difficult like clear definition should we then have different opening of like different job position that cover those those tasks for an L pass covering those tasks. So this is what I will start from. Thank you. Thank you very much. So next steps, Professor Stuart Lane. Thank you for the invitation to speak and in particular to the two people who come before me that they'd always help you frame your own own comments and make three points and I guess then an observation. And I signed up to the slow science movement a long time ago. And I don't tweet, and I don't blog, and I perhaps can talk about why I don't think that's necessarily the primary role of a scientist in a democratic system, perhaps a little bit later. I actually agree very strongly with much of what the slow science movement argues for because of a deep problem concerning the sustainability of what we do. What we do is not sustainable in my field, when I started my PhD 1991 through a few hundred papers published per year. That's grown exponentially since then to 10s of thousands. We're producing an awful lot of work and who we producing it for. It's not sustainable, and it leads to a particular sort of value system that focuses on counting rather than not only the quality, which I think is, is where we have to go of what we do, but perhaps more directly. It goes in the direction of undervaluing a series of other things that are important to being the life of an academic. And the emotional support we give to colleagues and to students in helping them to gain the kind of training that they need the experience that they need in the work that they kind of do and this undervaluing of the other dimensions of being a good colleague, were any enormously, but I don't think it's just about the, the, the life of an academic. And some of you may have heard of the philosopher, and Isabelle Stengers and Isabelle Stengers makes a lovely quote back in 2005. How can we present a proposal intended not to say what is or what to be, but to provoke thought, a proposal that requires no other verification than the way in which it is able to slow down reasoning and create an opportunity to arouse a slightly different awareness of the problems and situations mobling us. And for me, Isabelle Stengers captures there the essence of being a scientist. It's being able to, in my case as a geoscientist to be in the landscape and say, Hang on a minute. That doesn't make sense. I'm going the wrong way. I need to change direction. I need to look at it in a different way. It's then that we make scientific progress. It's not scientific achievements are not what we publish scientific achievements are are not how much we publish they are those moments when we suddenly discover that our knowledge needs to change and the history of science is replete with examples of where that's the case. Of course, to be talking about slow science at the end of a year when science has gone incredibly quickly in terms of dealing with a global helping to deal with the global pandemic and thinking of a vaccination in recent very old to be talking about slow science and we don't need scientists to go really quickly to solve the kinds of problems that we're facing as a society. But COVID itself is a fundamental example of slow science, because the basis of the vaccines that are now starting to help us get back towards some sort of normal life weren't developed in a year. They were developed over 2030 40 years back into the 1980s. And that's what we mean by the kind of science that I think we should be doing that science that ultimately gives the foundations for a fair and democratic society. And it is the solution. And it is the challenge with slow science is the system. And of course, it's very easy for me as an established scientists to take risks, but how do you think about working in a system that still despite the work of many research and university appointments panels still focuses on quantity quantification of the end, those kinds of easily measured outputs that are apparently objective when you actually look into them are just a subjective as other kinds of things. I'm a strong supporter of the slow science movement, although I do worry that it's going to take some time before it actually becomes something that's fairly and fully applied in the academy. Thank you. Thank you very much to work. So next up is Professor delta Tesla. Yeah, and thank you also to the for me for to the convenience for organizing this interesting section and looking at the number of participants you really kind of put the finger fingers on the pilots. It's a very hot topic. And I think the previous speakers because they summarized a lot of my thoughts which I won't repeat and maybe just to adding a bit. I also completely agree with the idea behind the slow science manifesto because I do think science thinking needs simply time and also like Stuart explained quite nicely this opportunity to adapt and maybe change and be flexible in terms of our scientific approaches. And what I often notice is, and I would be a stronger support of incremental development and I observe in the past few years. There was this development that somehow incremental science is viewed as pure, the poor science, whether this is in grand proposal panels of publication. It's often viewed this or that's just incremental science and in my view, slow science is somehow should be at least in parts incremental science because we are building up on previous knowledge and taking again our time to to move forward. And also, sometimes observe is that slow science is used as an excuse for perfectionism. And in my view and again I've worked with many colleagues I've supervised a lot of colleagues postdocs PhDs who use the excuse us. It's not perfect yet to not doing anything and I think perfect perfectionism can really limit scientific progress. It's kind of, it's finding the balance between thinking time and not fall into the perfectionism trap. If I can put it this way. So science needs reflection. And also in my view I do think writing a paper and publishing is often the only way to reflect. Again, I've seen this a lot in my in my own group that just in the process of completing a paper that's the time where where we reflect and where we have to interpret it our own findings and make them understandable to the wider community and audience and I think paper writing does exactly this, this step. But of course at the rate as we see it at the moment it's again as Stuart said completely unsustainable. Just the amount of papers again, when I talk about out of my journey hydrological processes we get more than 1000 papers submitted per year, and that's a relatively small journey so it's it is not sustainable. I started I was also someone who for a long time time try to protect myself from any social media exchange simply because I've reached my bandwidth. I couldn't take any more interaction in. I'm on Twitter now since 2020. So about a year. It's kind of it's just tender build that I maybe check every few days. But it is again it's a fine line of just making one busy. That's my view and distracting maybe from this so important reflection time and thinking time. And just a final note maybe on this what qualities should the system reward. I, again, in my view, I always fail that if someone reads my papers. That's an important reward so I somehow have written something important maybe something relevant for some other scientists and maybe in a way which other people can read. And I think somehow we do need matrix of assessment, whether they are viewed as objective or subjective, simply for pragmatic reasons, whether we are in an appointment panels whether we are on promotion panels. But I completely agree. Anyone on any such decision forum or panel should consider a rounded CV. So by rounded CV and I think Stuart again mentioned this it should be a combination that a scientist has shown the person can write publications, not not many but good quality paper so this means this person can complete science and investigations, but aspects of mentoring and scientific service are as important. So I do think it's trying to find these rounded CVs, which, which should be maybe use as matrix for assessment if I can call it this way. Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. I hope the audience could grasp all the spectrum of opinions that we have today on board. We, the way we thought this debate to proceed now is that we select the three major topics around which we'd like debate debate to revolve. And then we move also according to what pops up in the Q&A. In fact, we have two questions by Pierre Rieblat, who touched one of our points that was was thought to be number two but we move it to position number one now. And that is the trade off between quantity and quality of output. So short funding periods and the importance of publication metrics keep the competitive environment. But they reward speed over quality. So how much slower is the sweet spot with scientists perform better without the urge to publish so that that's kind of the main topic right now and the question from the Q&A directly is the ratio papers out over time available is the key limiting variable to ensure proper peer review and the required quality control. I think the preprint open platforms are not improving the problems caused by the publisher parish motto. On the contrary, I would rather prefer a global limitation of the number of papers per authors, perhaps, that can be submitted every year. There are three conferences and one paper article per conference for time limitations in life. We also have time limitation so application quota decided at a global level, particularly could be a valuable and fair instrument. What do our speakers think about this should keep the same order as before. So I think that's a good question. I think adding sort of another metric that then prevents people from publishing a certain amount per year is not really the way to go I mean I think different fields do science and publish different increments in different ways. Science for example takes longer and you know we may expect fewer papers and for people who are in a very fast moving biomedical type of field. So I don't know if a hard number is that way I will say that I think there's already kind of a self selection or a recognition among scientists that if you look at someone's Google scholar profile and you see their you know 10 to 37 or you know just just you know numbers above 10 or even five sometimes in certain fields then you do start to question what they're how they could possibly be doing real science I guess is my own feeling that's there's some self collection self selection among researchers to recognize that you know if someone's publishing this much then I don't see how it's possible to have a time for it to be the quality that we should expect. That said I think there's a disconnect between what individual researchers see or view this kind of publication metric and universities do and I think there's a perverse incentive for many universities financial incentive given to researchers who are both directly or explicitly and implicitly to raise their publication numbers and that this is something that we as faculty need to really be fighting against and be educating our universities and revising the way that universities are ranked such that this number of publications is never a factor. That's my own sense about it. Thank you. Yeah, like I found it as well very kind of hard question I don't know I wouldn't also go for a new, a new number or new index. I would still hope that it's more something and the committees are like should be able to actually read our papers through. And evaluate on the quality more than on the quantity and I wouldn't limit people I mean if maybe a scientist is very productive one year and then but then it's not productive maybe for a couple of years before because it was doing like the investigation was doing the research and and then in one year is able maybe to have to produce maybe two three papers. That's great. And I wouldn't limit them. This is out of the day draft comments. Sorry. And, but I also find an interest as a part of the preprint I have kind of I'm likely to hear what would be with the other speakers also say about preprint services I'm still a little bit. I'm unsure of the, the pro and the con of the services. I've seen I know that it changes a lot depending on the field, the disciplines and the discipline. I've seen how much preprints have been used over the past year for the during the pandemic by journalists not really knowing what appropriate ease and and use it as as published peer review research to give answers to people. And I'm like is it really, I don't know, is it really working this way is it without is it valuable also in the debate on publishing more or less or being faster or slow in science. I don't know. Thank you. Yes, I follow Valerie's comments with it with it with a few comments on preprints I mean I'm afraid I'm deeply skeptical about the notion of preprints. One of the problems we've got is we've forgotten what academic publication is about an academic publication is about producing a work that stands the test of time. It's almost impossible to unpublish a journal article. And I often give the example of my father in law who wrote a paper in the early 1970s that is still being cited and it was like he's not in an academic now and I was able to show him this once that his paper was still being read and cited. So it stands the test of time because it's been through peer review process so one of the things we have to ask ourselves is is the peer review process working and is the peer review process producing fair outcomes. If it is, then we have a clear distinction between publication of a journal article in a peer review system, and what is in a preprint server. Now if you take the volume of material that's been published in the in journals at the moment, we don't have enough time to read that, let alone to be reading material that may well be misleading because it hasn't been through an effective peer review system. And much as though it's frustrating because it takes a good peer review system takes time and requires the effort of a large number of people and all the questions over open access and publishers and profit and so on come into that. If we put all of that to one side, we still are left with the principle that the there is something about the journal article and its role and its status that I worry we are losing in this rush to make our findings available ever more quickly. Thank you. Yeah, I mean I can again completely agree what Stuart said on the preprints we have to keep in in mind that peer review has his place and and and some kind of importance. But I still wanted to get back what Whitney said at the beginning. And I mean I myself would describe myself as a person who publishes quite a lot per per year. So probably it is easily 10 papers per year. I'm not the first author on all of these papers it's kind of it's my group, and I feel again the responsibility that my PhDs and postdocs they get their papers out. But at the same time I take pride. I read all of these papers at least three times and added them heavily. So what it is and I know we scientists often don't want to hear it. Writing papers is just extremely hard work, and it's a lot of work. And I think that there is just, we just have to accept this and I've seen some questions in terms of this is maybe related that some participant asked whether we feel that social media activity is kind of it, or that slow science means we shouldn't do social media I think I can only speak about myself the reason for limited social media is not that I doubt the value of it in terms of spreading the science. It's simply a time capacity and there, that's maybe again a personal choice. I would say, then I would prefer the limited time which is available to me as a mother as well, which I want to prioritize. I would prefer to edit papers of my group members, rather than posting any step in my thinking on social media I think that's that's the thing that I sometimes get the impression. Any in between step is already is shared on social media and we have to remember every post takes a few seconds and these few seconds are just taking away from a 24 hour day. I think that's more my point of view that it's not social media is versus slow science it's just a personal capacity question, what's doable in 24 hours day. Okay, thank you very much. I think that social media is popping up more often than not in our reply so perhaps we could dive deeper into this topic. If my co-communist can help me a second here are there any questions in the Q&A. Hi, so there was one main question I think that wasn't clear to people. Why science communication would be actually slow science. I think there would be good for you maybe to answer or to say something. I have that difficulty making that connection as well I don't see them as that odds with each other that you can still take your time on your science but still be a really good science communicator. And I agree with Derkta but I also feel that you know we talked about the benefit of being a well rounded scientist with a profile that spans more than just publications and so I consider science communication part of that well roundedness and and not just communication at conferences to our colleagues or direct colleagues but to our parents or friends or grandparents you know people in the public the people that give us money to actually do science I just think it's really fundamental that we build into our profile as scientists this communication aspect and social media is just one of many venues, but I think it's proven itself to be an extremely effective one that especially young people recognize and use like the back of their hands that they can use phones and Twitter better than they can use, you know, a computer and Excel spreadsheet. So I just see it as a really fundamental aspect of our independent of the slow science versus fast that's just part of our jobs. Thank you. Just what do you have. And do you have a statement. Yes. You probably guess I have a certain skepticism for social media. My starting point is actually I think there's certain liberty. I think we should be finding ways of practicing. As a scientist we should we should in social media is an important way of communicating if that kind of communication to us is important then we should we should strongly be doing it and I think that the, the thing that has been eroded, certainly in the time I've been in the university system is the notion of academic freedom and one of the great things I think society has is people who are do have that freedom and take the responsibilities and the rights that come with that but the freedom then I think to choose the way you wish to communicate is perhaps where the slow science movement is a little bit too strong. I am deeply skeptical about social media for two reasons. I mean one is dirt is is explain this very well it takes time, and I have seen recently situations with young scientists, effectively displacing other kinds of important activities like paper writing with tweets and blocks and assuming that those are somehow interchangeable and I think we have to be very careful about that, that that message. But secondly I think we have to also ask ourselves realistically we each have a Twitter site and how many of us are going to be able to follow all of the Twitter sites we want to follow in a reasonable amount of time. And how many of us actually have people outside of the academic academy following our tweets and I suspect we would be somewhat disappointed where we to look at the number of people in society at large that actually follow academics I suspect there are a few academics that are followed, but for 99.9% of us most of our workers have absolutely no interest to the general public. And that gets into a much deeper question about the democratization of scientific processes and progress. And we are working in a very asymmetrical system, certain people, whether they're elected officials whether it's certain kinds of industries have much more power to commission sites that we do to fund what we do than others, and actually the large swathes of the population out there have very little opportunity to influence what we what we do, and I therefore find myself in a very uncomfortable position. If I start saying I must. I know the word must there. I think it's fine to do it if you wish but if I if I must start disseminating my my material to these people in effect I'm imposing a particular worldview on them that they've had absolutely no say in terms of shaping and developing and so I think there are deep democratic questions here that we have to reflect upon when we start to talk about what society wants and our responsibilities to society they are more complex than you perhaps imagine. Thank you very much for this thoughtful answer. One thing we haven't mentioned is that questions in the Q&A can be upvoted so we'll get through as many questions as possible, but we have limited time today. So if you think there is one particular topic address based questions that merits more attention than others, you're free to upload them. For example, the top one right now we could address by anonymous attendee. I have always related the fast science culture with the bottleneck to access jobs in academia. There is many new thousands of PhD students and postdocs looking for jobs in academia every year versus very few positions available. Can we address the problematic fast science culture without treating the problem of the lack of jobs in academia? Should universities start funding much fewer PhD projects to reduce this problem? Is this likely to happen considering that they function as for profit businesses nowadays? How do we address the fast science culture problem if this can be changed? I would like to answer this. I mean, I raised my hands. I don't know if you see this. I wouldn't call it so much a fast science, but I think the issue that's at least European-wide is a funding issue. It's that most funding bodies fund PhD projects. We have one major graduate schools and I would say again, compared to even just a few years ago, if someone wants to do a PhD today, they find a project very, very quickly. And I think the concern is and the big issue is that then no funding is available for postdoc positions. And I think we are, for years now, that applies to many European countries. I'm not so aware about how it is in North America, for example, other continents. But I think that is, is we are producing the really masses of PhD students and no, no opportunity is provided what comes next. And I think that's, that's a major issue that the funding bodies actually tell us you can't ask for a postdoc position to apply. It's too expensive. And I think so. I think that's not so much a fast, slow science question that's really a major funding issue and probably we need again a paradigm shift here in terms of that maybe not a necessary next step after doing your master does not have necessarily to be doing your PhD. Yeah, I agree completely with dirt on that. And I think there was this really nice article just came out yesterday I think in EOS, or was trying to revise the idea of a pipeline or a track in academia to something more analogous to sort of braided streams, you know, and kind of how there can be different tracks that people take and sometimes a master's goes into industry for a while and goes to PhD and I think we are stuck in this kind of classic academic track that then funnels PhD to postdoc and says well your next natural step is obviously, you know, a faculty position and those jobs don't exist but we still need the education level of a PhD to go into all sorts of other branches of our science and I don't think we want to limit the number of PhDs we have but we want to be more flexible and more informative about other career paths besides academia. Thank you. I just a quick comment that I know there is some flexibility in certain funding agents for example, I myself I am currently employed as a postdoc on funding that was originally thought to be for a PhD student. So, at least, you are not supposed to say this Andrea. Right. So, it is kind of our attention that we have a lot of questions talking about how we survey the current state how could we go ahead and solve things. Yeah sure I could I could simply see that so I screened the Q&A box and indeed there's a lot of discussion on the current state right what do we like what do we not like and I think it would be a good idea to kind of shift the scope slightly to move ahead. What could be ways out of the problems that we've identified or the current issues that we've identified and in the Q&A there's some suggestions like like reducing the number of students would basically automatic might automatically lead back to slow science the number of students PhD students postdocs. And another suggestion that was was brought up would be more fixed term contracts might automatically lead to slowing down of the scientific process, if there would be any ideas from the from the panel. I don't know who wishes to go ahead. So what would be ways out of the current of the current situation. If I can say something that I often have the feeling that the shortness of contracts is is really a problem, especially I would say after the PhD. I mean, I've been running on two years projects and for the past four years, I had to stop after one year one postdoc because I got them funding for two years project but now, for example, I am after one year of project and the pandemic. I haven't got much results. I'm supposed to write a new project because in one year I won't have funding. And how do I do that and I would I would like to have more time to work on my project I don't I don't really have it. And I really have to think about the new ideas and how to continue working on that so I would say the one one for me one solution will really be stop having at least the one year contracts. They, to me they don't make sense. Because you take at least six months to get into a project into a subject and then after six months you're supposed to have produced something and then go somewhere else. Two years is the way in between and maybe if there wasn't a pandemic. But I would say that three working on a three to four years timeline for me will be a solution. I don't know how easily because that that is costly I know it's expensive I totally see the point we will so why are you funding ages and funds more PhD candidates than them postdocs, yeah, they are cheaper. But is it, I mean, does it really work in this way. No, to me, please. Yes, I mean, I think, I think that there is a what just to bridge across bridge back for a moment to the last question. There is a fundamental problem. There are many more people doing PhDs who would like academic jobs, then there will ever be academic jobs and that is actually in that kind of situation things are not straightforward. So thinking about the broader structure of how funding is distributed across different levels of career, I think is very important. You know, and I'm a great believer in the idea that we shouldn't be overfunding academics with too many PhD students those kinds of simple types of measures. There are a lot of things that that are various degrees have had various degrees of adoption in the academic world that that will help. I mean one is the San Francisco declaration on research assessment, which commits us as evaluators to evaluating the quality of publications. And I've been involved in appointments panels, and also in the Swiss National Science Foundation recently where we were actually talking about limiting the number of outputs and that academics, applying for funding, whether it's projects or whether it's careers funding early career researchers limiting the number of outputs that you have. So for somebody who's applying for a postdoc level research fellowship, for instance, we would just say the only thing we want to know about the three outputs we don't want to full output list because those sorts of things and help people to focus on quality and not the quantity. The same is true in appointments procedures. I mean, one of the great difficulties on an appointments panel is when you've got somebody who's been in academia for 20 years. There's a long, long CV up against somebody who's three or four years out of a postdoc. And again, get both of them to submit their, their three or four or five best papers these are the kinds of things that can switch emphasis on to the quality of what you're doing and help help to judge people. Another thing is moving to and this touches this, this, what Whitney said was the idea I'm quite like, you know, she she gave braided river. As I work on braided rivers but but but the note the notion of a net academic age helps in this sense and again the Swiss National Science Foundation has recently moved away completely from conventional eligibility requirements for research fellowship funding. It's called a net academic age where it is the number of, of months or years since you finished your PhD spent working in an academic research post that defines your academic age so if you've had caring leave. If you've gone off and work for three years in industry, those years are not counted in terms of your net academic age which is then used to judge that the CVs that the CVs that we have. There are things that can be done I mean the problem with these, these things is that and I can certainly share the Swiss National Science Foundation's experiences that you can sign up to these policies, and you can get these policies going, getting academics to follow them is much more challenging. And that actually, I remain quite quite astonished sometimes that the extent to which this culture of counting has become embedded in the academy in a very uncritical way and it's that that's got to change. So how the match you come up with initiatives and new policies, and it's the it's the people like it might me who've actually got to change not actually necessarily the policies themselves. Yeah, thank you very much for this because it leads very well into the most upvoted questions. Sabrina Metzger is asking, can the panelists give examples how to be a role model in the subject that is, for instance, for instance, what they tell the students who wants to start on that. Yeah, I mean I assume it's on the subject is still the slow science for this fast science so that's what I would answer now I don't know if this is the subject of the question. The problem is, again, the students of course the most countries they have to write now three papers to be able to submit a PhD. I think that's right, rather than focusing on PhD thesis which are then rotting away and getting dusted off in some library so I think this focus but that's, again, it's it's three papers. And in most countries this is just changing in Germany now that DFG funds more for your projects, but usually it's three year funding and you have to write your three papers. So, again, if you're honest and like Whitney said earlier you have to do at least a year if not 18 months fieldwork usually at least in the field I'm working. That's three extremely tough years that's I tell my students okay. If you want to do a PhD, these three years will be the toughest. Even postdoc years already easier because you kind of can spread usually what you are working on. And there it's even particular important in these three years to focus and use your time very very wisely and avoid any displacement activity as Stuart mentioned earlier, and because otherwise it's impossible to do fieldwork to do writing three years and get through this unheard through these three years. I'm trying to tell my students remember you don't have to win your Nobel Prize just yet after your PhD, you are just demonstrating that you can independently conduct research during your PhD so keep a lot of the ideas. I will follow up later in your life. So again this links a bit back to this perfectionism which I said earlier, or mentioned earlier because that's what I observe. Often this members in my team is this, but if I just work another two months on this it will get so much better and it's the most important law is the 8020 rule is that when you have reached your your 80% input and hard work. If you spend another 20% and another year working and it gets me be 20% better so sometimes it's just important to say it's, it's fine it's good and complete things. I'm not advocating when I say this way low quality again just to emphasize this but I try to to steal my students in in learning when to say stop and that's just fine. So that's what I tend most someone like to go next and comment on this. Sure, I can. I guess I must admit I struggle a lot with communicating the students, how exactly they should go about publishing their work. And because I've become more and more cognizant of the fact that publications are used as an immediate tool or limit among search committees for reading students or postdocs out and sometimes it's the number sometimes it's just having any or having all of your PhD topics published. So I feel that students sort of break down in my office because another faculty member or committee member has told them that they should have X number of publications by the time they graduate if they want to be taken seriously for an academic job. And so I feel often I have to I feel the pressure to balance this even on their behalf, again something that's more slow, slow science like that allows them to take their time and cultivate the results and tweak them after feedback and go to conferences and present on them, etc. So I haven't found the right answer to the balance I guess I don't require three publications by the time they finish but three publishable units and various states of publication. I'll also note that I've been struck since moving to Europe that at how much shorter the PhDs are typically three, maybe three and a half to four years, whereas in the US. It's more like five to six years and yet the publication requirements are actually identical three, typically three chapters are at a minimum and so I think that's an interesting cultural difference between Europe and the US. And so may impact, you know, our publication standards I'm not sure. So I don't have an answer but that's my thoughts on it. Yeah, I think that the notion of the PhD is is evolved is actually become a little bit confused at the moment I mean in Europe the PhD is formally a training degree, it's not a research degree. And we've often forgotten that. And so therefore my view of PhD students is very much trying to think about how I train my students to get to where they want to go to after the end of the PhD. And it's a bit like what I do also with my master's students and my master's students I try and always have a conversation in the last year where I think about where they want to go, what they need to go to get and I think it's the same in the PhD it's about thinking of the PhD. And what are the advantages if you say you'd like to go to an academic career how best can you get there what do you, what do you need to do and what can I do as an academic supervisor to help you to get there, but also recognizing that there will be many others who will have done a PhD, but will not have at the end goal, wanting to become an academic and I think that's where is a, we have to remember that the PhD degree is not a research, it's not a research project. That's meant to lead to very distinct research outcomes, papers etc in itself. I mean, it can do because that's actually quite a good way to get somebody on the route to an academic career, but not necessarily. And so that notion of the training and the wider support that a student needs during their PhD I think is actually very important. It's not just preparing people to get academic jobs. If it is to ask enough jobs and we'd have to put back the number of PhD students very rapidly. Thank you. So I think we have addressed this topic quite a lot in the past minutes. I'd like to launch a new topic that I don't know if this has been mentioned in the questions already, but that is work-life balance. The only friendliness fair to childless researchers is working over hours fair to researchers having persons to care of perhaps we should all just work no more than eight hours a day. I would like to give an answer to that. Go ahead. Well, very, very good question. Yes, sometimes I'm so I'm I'm I'm I don't have children. I don't have a family to take care of for the moment, but I often wonder like, so since I'm in this condition so am I supposed or am I expected to just be available anytime, any day. Sometimes I have the feeling that the answer is yes. And then it's not just my feeling in debating this with other friends and colleague at the same condition and it's it's a little bit of, yeah, and it is some my time since I'm not caring for just I mean I'm myself than less valuable, I think it's not. And as far as I know, and I do it I do work over hours at times but I'm really wishing that we can pass the message that should not be the rule. I don't like the idea that as I work as a scientist and I, it's okay if I work 12 hours a day, or every weekend. There are times that that is requested and needed because of field work for example and if I'm a field, and if it's a weekend, still enough to do my field work, or, or like maybe some experiments that take longer than the needed but I really hope that. Yeah, that the time like work-life balance is very important and sometimes I feel like we are, as in general we are expected to work too much, too many hours and then that I would say also is disruptive in terms of production and quality and so on so it's something that we should really be careful about and I hope I never had supervisors that were asking me to to overdo so and but I, and I hope that, and I have the feeling that today. So, as you are the word and we can are all very, I really like what you're saying so I think your students are very likely to have supervisors. So, I think you should really go into that direction. Okay, Delta has a raised hand. I think with me was before me. Okay, you're right. Yeah, I agree with Valeria and I guess I would just say I'm not sure the concept of fairness is a is a great way to look at this problem I think it's become clear we've, we should move away from the perception of an ideal, or correct academic path and move towards greater kind of like I mentioned that before the US article on the Braided River and we should think of, you know, branches of our lives and careers and other creative interests that we've in and out from each other and I think this could actually benefit science, because you know our own as scientists diversity of pursuit and the act of doing other things may influence our creativity or productivity. And I know that for many of us, I do have a child and I do try to maintain a work like balance and probably terrible at it but I know that that many of us, science is really a pursuit of passion which means that even if the academic world were designed to facilitate a better work like balance some of us might actually struggle to take advantage of that. You know, we do get really engaged in our work and sometimes lose perspective on what, what is more important around us and I mean I think sometimes that historically this really hard pursuit of a problem is what actually has led to many scientific break breakthroughs in the past as people kind of sitting in their basement doing experiments or, you know, playing with radiogenic materials and you know so I think, I think there's, we just need a flexibility. Just to, to as you this the flexibility is the important thing but again my experience shows that often this seniority, this power of flexibility increases. So again in my experience I was a full professor before I came pregnant, and first I was astonished how many of my colleagues assume some kind of major plan in doing this which was of course ridiculous I mean you can plan. These things, but that there was just these basic assumption or brilliant now she is a full professor now she can go ahead and start her family so that's the first thing I experienced which I found outrageous. Secondly, again this was at the University in the UK, where our then principle started breakfast meetings. Eight o'clock. And again I was the only one, the only faculty member who reminded him that actually the University nursery didn't open until 830. So I was then offered personal meetings but of course what I missed in these personal meetings with the principle it's all these important decisions and discussions which are going on. There is something fundamentally wrong. And at the end I declined, of course, to go to these breakfast meetings, but I could do so because I had a tenured full professorship position I would have not dare to do this on a lecture you know to cancel my principle of the university and I think that's that's that's the fundamental problem is the flexibility which is needed and the flexibility solve so many problems, but we don't have the flexibility until we reach a certain seniority and I think that's still a major problem. Yeah, I guess we all kind of have to play but it was the game as long as we're non tenured seems like on this note there's a question from the Q&A that has been suggested that one of my co convenience. Do you think that early career scientists should take a different approach to slow versus fast science in comparison to tenure professors along these lines. I think it is the response to this question touches people in different ways. I think that the more senior scientists you have tenure who established have some responsibility to make sure that the system, I don't have a fair system but at least as fair as it can be. That kind of touches a little bit on the on the on the last question that whilst on on the one hand I think one is I like about being an academic is the liberty to work the extra hours if I so wish we also have to trade that off against those who have caring responsibilities or other limits on the extent to which they can actually take on that liberty. So if we have a system that does not recognize those constraints on what people can do in terms of their time, then we run the risk of perpetuating inequalities, even more so than they are now so that is where I think the responsibilities for for for in people who who have more senior roles are actually really very serious they have to think about what what life is like and for more junior staff and not forget it because many of them will have been through it through themselves. But on the other hand I think that and where where I, I, I, I suppose I worry a little bit is the system for more junior staff and because, whilst there are clearly university systems, research councils that are moving more towards policies that that aren't formally slow science policies but they're lying with them, adoption of Dora being one thing. Not everyone does. And as I said earlier, even when you have these policies they aren't necessarily applied. So that carries a risk for more, more, more junior staff if you're in a system that might have laudable goals but where those goals aren't necessarily being being followed or adopted and so it's it's not it's not easy. And I wish that there was a simple answer answer to that I think that it really does come back to. If you like what I see is the problem which is people like me and not actually junior researchers we have to set a better framework. And it'd be very interesting if you can analyse today who came to this, this chat to this, this debate and think about how many people who actually would. It might be quite nice if they could think about so science actually came this morning to listen to it. And I think those are the sorts of difficulties to use that we have. Thank you very much Stuart. So we have about 17 minutes left. And it would be cool. As Stuart just mentioned we have to put a better framework we have to make a better framework for this system. And so perhaps it's the time to think about what can realistically be done in the future. I have a sharp question to all of you that is. If you could make a new rule to change the system. What would that be one rule. Who would like to start with that malaria longer fixed terms contracts. Yeah, this bundle dismantle the less than one year contract for sure, there should not exist. For me, that would be one. Okay, thank you. I would say something that some places already do but as to abolish the use of publication numbers and agent X and search committees, and instead read individual papers. Thank you. Yes, Stuart. Do away with publication lists do away with orchid numbers that allow people to find publication lists easily do away with being allowed to put Google scholar links into CVs and simply ask people to nominate five outputs that maybe publications there may be other things in all assessment competitions that might be slightly lower for more junior people but certainly not going by five in any competition at all. Stuart. I have nothing left the major roads I think we are mentioned I would probably pick the, the, the first one the permanent contract is just this has to change in so many countries that institution just offer permanent contracts. If someone wants to retire at an institution or not can should be their decision and not this. This is the most important one. Thank you very much. Okay, these were very sharp questions. I was thinking harsh debate will start among them, but that's not the case so we have quite some time left for q amp a top on the list. Do my co convenience have some questions ready. Otherwise, I'm going to read them right from the top. Maybe let's just take one or two more minutes maybe to dive into these these four suggested changes right these ones change suggestions. So how would you judge the chances or the pace that these changes could be implemented I mean long contracts is definitely one right and the other one would be the publication part. How long do you think this will take months, years, decades, and who should be the the driving agents for that right. On other words, if there is hope, how long should we wait for that and who should get active now. Valeria, do you want to start. Yeah, sure. I would say will be a process that has to be taken lead from the institutions themselves and defending agency probably because because they go together. I understand that university don't then the fundings for everybody is that we need external funding for the agency but if if there was a little bit more a discussion or like even a conversation among these terms and and for example I know that LMU as a nice policy that please they abolished any contract less than six months. Six months contracts are possible. It's something that has to start from institutions and then cover, like, possibly pirated from top to bottom. Any other takes on this question by me here. I would say I guess the short term contract issue is a harder one because it has a strong financial inputs. And you know one of the discussions I saw, I can't remember if it's Twitter or Facebook one of the social media sites that I follow, brought up that a lot of these short term contracts are associated with startups of new faculty. And so, you know, like they won't provide an entire postdoc, but they'll provide six months of a postdoc with the hope that the new faculty will also provide six months and, you know, and so a lot of times it's kind of a, you may accidentally disadvantage the young researchers who not were not being fully supported by their university but partly to hire someone and then hope that they can carry on the funding. And that one's really quite, quite tricky. In terms of the search committees and devaluing numbers and metrics I think it's already happening in a lot of places I came from UT Austin where it was, I think unfortunately very heavy heavily used in initial searches because we have hundreds of applicants. And then to eth where it's, you know, it's basically not even looked at we don't even examine the h index we don't count the number of publications. And so I've, you know, I've already seen this transition occur just in my own career, which I think is wonderful and I think it's, it's not actually the young people's responsibility to advocate for this it's mine now as someone who's seen both systems and really values the, you know, the taking the time and the extra time required by the search committee to just read people's papers. I think that's all it requires as those of us to be, we're on the committees to be a little less lazy. Okay, thank you very much. I guess we have one Q&A that has been highlighted to me. There is people who decide future developments in science nowadays were successful in the fast system as it is. Do you think they try to prevent a shift because they could lose their influence if they are evaluated differently. I would like to say something on this. I think I didn't understand the question correctly so yeah. The question is that the people that should now propose a change that they are, I guess, among our panelists that would be witnessed your and you. Are you successful in the fast science system as it was. And do you think they would prevent a shift because they could you could lose your influence if you're evaluated differently. Basically, people that have reason with it with this is okay it's clear now. Stuart has a raise hand. I, perhaps I'm the only person that, oh well, I started I think in the slow system. When I was a PhD student, we didn't really have email. And the world wide web didn't wasn't something you used if you wanted to go and read something you had to get out of your office and walk across campus to the library. I think that the, the kind of people in in senior positions at the moment are probably more from that kind of sort of system. What I've seen which I think is is more ensuring more reassuring and more heartening is colleagues who are biologically younger than me, but who are now taking on senior leadership roles in universities, who are very sensitive to these issues and actually see a move away from the kind of fast science that has has come about and in that sense I'm actually more optimistic that things, things are going to change. And of course, hopefully that will be rapidly but as I think there's also a sense in the early career research community that the nature of science and what science has become is a severe problem and hopefully in 10 to 15 years. Early career researchers will be in a position to also reinforce the kinds of changes that are needed. So I'm always optimistic person and I'm optimistic that things are changing in the right direction. Yeah, maybe, maybe just quickly to add. So I would also agree I didn't grow up in the fast system. I also still remember to send hard copy manuscripts to journal and then getting several months later, handwritten comments on our manuscript. There was anything than fast science, but I agree with steward I think it's, it's also the confidence be as mid career scientists and early career scientists to continue to mention these issues and to say these issues and I've seen a change, at least in the last 10 years. In the past, I was often told to it, dirty don't say certain things you know this might affect your career negatively. Never, ever did I have any negative effect on my career despite these threats. And I think that's, that's maybe important that we just have this confidence to, to, to say, our, our concerns on all the different aspects be in the past today, and I do see like steward there are more and more coming now into the universities into the into the different institutions, maybe at the moment stay on mid career level, but to do open their mouse and to do question the existing system and I think that's important. Thank you very much. There are a few more questions that would like to have addressed. As fast science culture necessitated your department's hiring of more adjuncts doesn't seem to spark. I think that's a really difficult question to ask because there's a very big difference between countries, and also between universities within those countries in the extent to which that solutions actually allowed so in my university. They're not allowed at all. So they're very strict rules on on hiring hiring people to do certain roles, and also very strong pressure from some of what we call them the quantum media, the to prevent us from from doing that. And so it's it's it does I think it's it's quite a hard question to respond to. And next question, or more like an interesting statement that maybe sparks some discussion is. I think talking about how science is a work of passion, or how scientists are super passionate about the job often justifies working and reasonable hours and contributes to toxic cultures in academia, probably also to fast science. You think we should change the way we talk about that work. I can say something about that. I'm, I strive to say that I work as a scientist, not that I am a scientist because I don't personally like to be labeled as something like that, my job defines all I am, because I'm not just a scientist, I think I have, I am many other things. I would say that it goes back to what we say about the flexibility before so we know that we do. It's a little bit of, I don't say golden cage so we know that we have the freedom of the times to work as much as we want and sometimes you can be overdue. But I hope that, yeah, that that's, yeah, being passionate about your job, I think is a great thing and I might give you the chance to work maybe it will be due at times but you should also stand like yeah, you should be careful all the time and and stand for a Yeah, your, your, your health and your work life balance all the time, then being passionate about your job should not be the justification to over to you. No, absolutely. Okay, thank you. Is Micha having a follow up. It's more like a wrapping up, we screened the Q&A's at the moment it's what 54 open questions still and looking at the time we just have three to four minutes left. Feel free to browse the Q&A's. What we inspected and that is that there's a lot of questions comments and ideas regarding the publishing realm of science right. I mean we simply can't touch on that now at the moment but please feel free to look at the immense short course town hall meetings and other great debates during the next couple of days at EGU. Hopefully many of us can meet back there and share these these points one or more time again. Otherwise, I think we covered a lot of broad topics right in these Q&A's and maybe we will continue this a bit longer than now but but I think I just give it back to Andrea right. A lot of has been been covered publishing is an overarching hot topic just as an essence of the Q&A box at the moment. That's all from my side. Okay, then. I would have another question that has been highlighted me is thanks a lot for a very interesting helpful talk. Thank you for joining me. Concerning the career in academia, how significant is the impact of the journal for publication open access journals typically have a lower impact factor, but more people can read the paper so what would you recommend, since there was some problem connecting at the meeting I'm sure I'm not sure if this question is already answered many things so we haven't really Whitney. So I'm a big fan of open access journals and I'm really excited about the new ones that are developing at least in my own field that are actually being fueled by young researchers kind of from their bottom up and they're designing it from scratch and just think it's an amazing movement that is really exciting to me. And I think it's along the lines of, you know, some of the other metrics that the impact factors are not really that meaningful a lot of the high impact factors associated with certain high impact journals that I won't mention are associated with their front matter and other things that they that they post and also they have a heavy bias for publishing positive results, rather than negative ones in other words things that are just experiments for example these open access journals I think have less of that pressure and therefore have the potential to increase the quality of what we publish and we should just ignore their impact impact factor values. Okay, thank you very much I think it's about time to wrap this debate up. I would like to mention again that this is not a one time event. I repeat these sort of sessions perhaps in the following EG use and since we see that it has been very well attended. It might be worth it to create an environment where people can interact discuss and maybe produce some proposals in such meetings throughout breakout, not break up rooms in the terms of virtual ones but round tables, and so on. I have to apologize with my co-combiners not for introducing them at the beginning I forgot that but you have had the occasion to listen and look at them throughout the debate. And thank, I would like to thank all the speakers for their time and involvement both leading up to the debate. You're in the debate today. And if nothing else has something to add, I think we might give back the control to Chloe. I would like to say something thank you also to all the people that published or published who wrote in the chat all the questions we are going to look at them in detail and of course classify and see where the main issues are and going to use them for hopefully future events like this. So thank you very much for contributing in the chat so much as well.