DCP's ongoing problem with plagiarism

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

If any of the academics want to pull his dissertation and shoot it to me I'll give it a hard look for any instances of plagiarism. Your anonymity is, of course, sacrosanct.

LD791.9.N3 P442
Peterson, Daniel Carl, 1953-
Cosmogony and the ten separated intellects in the Rāḥat al-ʻAql of Ḥamīd al-Dīn al-Kirmānī / by Daniel Carl Peterson.
1990

- Doc

[_Tom]

Dr. Peterson’s post titled “A first pass at Sayyid Qutb” silently draws on the Wikipedia entry on Qutb.

Peterson: “Qutb published prolifically, including twenty-four books — among them Social Justice, Milestones (Ma‘alim fi al-Tariq), and a thirty-volume commentary entitled In the Shadow of the Qur’an (Fi Zilal al-Qur’an) — and nearly six hundred articles. He also left behind roughly thirty unpublished books, many of which were destroyed by the Egyptian government. His writings are wide-ranging, including novels and literary criticism, but they are particularly focused on what he regarded as the optimal social and political role of Islam.”

Wikipedia: “Author of 24 books, with around 30 books unpublished for different reasons (mainly destruction by the state), and at least 581 articles, including novels, literary arts critique and works on education, he is best known in the Muslim world for his work on what he believed to be the social and political role of Islam, particularly in his books Social Justice and Ma'alim fi al-Tariq (Milestones). His magnum opus, Fi Zilal al-Quran (In the Shade of the Qur'an), is a 30-volume commentary on the Quran.”


Peterson: “By the mid-1940s, many of his publications had been included in school, college, and university curricula, and he was followed by more than a few intellectuals, poets and other literary figures, and even some influential politicians.”

Wikipedia: “During most of his life, Qutb's inner circle mainly consisted of influential politicians, intellectuals, poets and literary figures, both of his age and of the preceding generation. By the mid-1940s, many of his writings were included in the curricula of schools, colleges and universities.”


Peterson: “Much of his commentary and his often fierce criticism was aimed at the Islamic world, but he also strongly disapproved of the society and culture of the United States. He had spent approximately two years in America, studying educational administration and working at Wilson Teacher’s College in Washington DC (a forerunner of today’s University of the District of Columbia), at the Colorado State College for Education in Greeley, and Stanford University, visiting many of the major American cities during his stay. . . . He viewed even the Americans of several generations ago as materialistic, violent, and sexually obsessed.”

Wikipedia: “Even though most of his observations and criticism were leveled at the Muslim world, Qutb is also known for his intense disapproval of the society and culture of the United States, which he saw as materialistic, and obsessed with violence and sexual pleasure. . . . Time in the United States, pursuing further studies in educational administration, cemented some of Qutb's views. Over two years, he worked and studied at Wilson Teachers' College in Washington, D.C. (one of the precursors to today's University of the District of Columbia), Colorado State College for Education in Greeley, and Stanford University. He visited the major cities of the United States.”

I look forward to reading Dr. Peterson’s second pass at Qutb. Perhaps he’ll touch upon Qutb’s childhood, his mental and physical health, his intellectual influences, his sexual history, his views of American women, and his criticisms of American food, clothing, haircuts, and jazz.

[_Tom]

After reading my post, Dr. Peterson added this curious note:

“(And, yes, I’ve relied for much of the basic information above — e.g. public and objective information such as dates, numbers of books, and the like, the sort of thing that would appear in any responsible biographical entry anywhere — on the relevant Wikipedia entry. A note such as this, which I’m creating for future use, is the skeletal framework that I will later flesh out from other sources, credited where appropriate. The metaphor that comes to mind is a continual laying down of sediment in successive waves. To vary the metaphor: On this blog, you’re sometimes peering into my workshop, seeing various drafts. The final version, in sha‘ Allah, will appear in print.)”

Why didn’t he credit Wikipedia in his original post? And why is a scholar of Arabic and Islamic studies using Wikipedia as a basic source as opposed to, say, the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World?

[_Lemmie]

After reading my post, Dr. Peterson added this curious note:

“(And, yes, I’ve relied for much of the basic information above — e.g. public and objective information such as dates, numbers of books, and the like, the sort of thing that would appear in any responsible biographical entry anywhere — on the relevant Wikipedia entry. A note such as this, which I’m creating for future use, is the skeletal framework that I will later flesh out from other sources, credited where appropriate. The metaphor that comes to mind is a continual laying down of sediment in successive waves. To vary the metaphor: On this blog, you’re sometimes peering into my workshop, seeing various drafts. The final version, in sha‘ Allah, will appear in print.)”

Why didn’t he credit Wikipedia in his original post? And why is a scholar of Arabic and Islamic studies using Wikipedia as a basic source as opposed to, say, the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World?

Even Wikipedia says not to cite Wikipedia:

Caution is advised when using Wikipedia as a source. In many academic institutions, references to Wikipedia, along with most encyclopedias, are unacceptable for research papers. See also Reliability of Wikipedia.

This does not mean that Wikipedia material should be used without citation: plagiarism of Wikipedia material is also academically unacceptable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... _Wikipedia

Or more specifically,

you decide to quote or paraphrase Wikipedia text (despite all the warnings above applying to the information in Wikipedia), then you must cite Wikipedia appropriately; otherwise you plagiarise, which is against academic norms and may subject you to censure. Such failure also violates Wikipedia's CC BY-SA copyright license, which is a violation of copyright law.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... _Wikipedia

Peterson plagiarizes, not only in defiance of the BYU honor code to which he is bound as BYU faculty and LDS church member, but also in defiance of actual law.

[_Tom]

Dr. Peterson adds another curious note:

“Postscript: One eager critic demands to know why I used Wikipedia rather than the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World for the notes above. Well, for one thing, because I have no reason to believe that Sayyid Qutb’s years of birth and death and numbers of published books vary widely from one source to another. For another, because my copy of the Oxford Encyclopedia resides in my campus office, which I haven’t visited in more than a month. For yet another, because the lines above are only preliminary draft text; the Oxford Encyclopedia is almost certainly still in the text’s future. And, by the way, it shouldn’t be presumed that I’m unfamiliar with the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World. I own a set. Moreover, I’m a contributor to it: I wrote its article on ‘Eschatology,’ as well as articles on two of the most important sects of Shi‘ism: ‘Ismāʿīliyya’ and ‘Zaydiyya.’)”

“Eager critic”? LOL. Dr. Peterson misses the point. Again.

[_Gadianton]

Tom, I read something just recently condemning Christopher Hitchens for being a "Google scholar".

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

I’m rolling me eyes so hard right I just did a backflip.

by the way, Mr. Peterson, why are you so obsessed with this board, checking it multiple times a day? Psychologically fascinating, indeed.

- Doc

[_moksha]

Pretty impressive that Dr. Peterson was a contributor to an article on eschatology in the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World. He undoubtedly provided a better understanding of the 72 virgins given in the Celestial Paradise Kingdom for those contributing to the defense of the faith. Hopefully, those followers of Allah will also have a greater appreciation of Vivaldi and snifters of orange soda.

[_Lemmie]

Dr. Peterson adds another curious note:

“Postscript: One eager critic demands to know why I used Wikipedia rather than the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World for the notes above. Well, for one thing, because I have no reason to believe that Sayyid Qutb’s years of birth and death and numbers of published books vary widely from one source to another. For another, because my copy of the Oxford Encyclopedia resides in my campus office, which I haven’t visited in more than a month. For yet another, because the lines above are only preliminary draft text; the Oxford Encyclopedia is almost certainly still in the text’s future. And, by the way, it shouldn’t be presumed that I’m unfamiliar with the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World. I own a set. Moreover, I’m a contributor to it: I wrote its article on ‘Eschatology,’ as well as articles on two of the most important sects of Shi‘ism: ‘Ismāʿīliyya’ and ‘Zaydiyya.’)”

“Eager critic”? LOL. Dr. Peterson misses the point. Again.

And the illustrious contributor to the Oxford Encyclopedia doesn’t have Internet access to it through his Institution? I do through my Institution. I call bull crap on this excuse by Peterson. He plagiarizes Wikipedia like the laziest freshman, excuses notwithstanding.

[_Lemmie]

I have posted this explanation about what constitutes plagiarism before, but since Peterson seems to have decided it is time to start up his nasty habit again, I thought it was worth reposting:

[/i]
Why this is plagiarism:

This paraphrase is a patchwork composed of pieces in the original author’s language (in red) and pieces in the student-writer’s words, all rearranged into a new pattern, but with none of the borrowed pieces in quotation marks.

Thus, even though the writer acknowledges the source of the material, the underlined phrases are falsely presented as the student’s own.

https://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/QPA_paraphrase.html

[bolding added]

For a prime example of this, let’s look at one of Peterson’s recent posts, titled Correcting a basic mistake in neuroscience, or just committing one? posted APRIL 23, 2020 BY DAN PETERSON.
( link: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeters ... g-one.html )

In this blog entry, Peterson is ostensibly reviewing and quoting from Douglas Fox, in Scientific American:

Dan Peterson:

I share some notes that I jotted down from Douglas Fox, “The Brain, Reimagined: Physicists who have revived experiments from 50 years ago say nerve cells communicate with mechanical pulses, not electric ones,” Scientific American (April 2018): 60-67:

Curiously, although physicians have been administering general anesthesia for nearly two centuries now, and although they have discovered dozens of different but effective anesthetic compounds, nobody actually knows exactly how anesthesia works. We know that they all shut down body and brain functions in the same order — memory formation first, then pain sensation, then consciousness and, ultimately, breathing — across all animal species, from flies to humans. But nitrous oxide , ether, sevoflurane, and xenon are so very different in their molecular structure that it seems highly unlikely that they function in the same way in their common effects.

Thomas Heimburg, a physicist at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen who trained in quantum mechanics and biophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, Germany, believes that anesthetics change the mechanical properties of nerves. What difference would that make? Writing for Scientific American, Douglas Fox says that,

If that is true, it means that nerve cells, or neurons, throughout the body and brain are mechanical machines, not the electric circuits scientists have believed in for decades (62).

The mechanical components may have been overlooked because of an accident of history: 50 years ago off-the-shelf instruments could readily measure the tiny electric impulses in neurons but not the mechanical ones. Hardware limitations influenced which discoveries scientists made and which ideas entered mainstream scientific thought. (63)

You’ll notice the last two paragraphs are framed as a quote of Fox’s article in Scientific American. The problem is, in the two paragraphs before that, to use the words in my opening quote, are plagiarism because “ even though the writer acknowledges the source of the material, the underlined phrases are falsely presented as the student’s own.”

Let’s compare, starting with the source of Peterson’s first paragraph, which although it is touted as a review, is still represented as Peterson’s own work by omitting quotation marks. Or should I say, misrepresented. The original, from Fox’s article in SA:

Physicians have administered general anesthetics for 170 years. They have discovered dozens of effective compounds. When given at progressively higher doses, the drugs all silence nerve functions in the body and brain in the same distinct order: first memory formation, then pain sensation, then consciousness,and eventually breathing. This same sequence happens across all animals, from humans to flies.Yet no one knows how anesthesia actually works. The molecular structures of nitrous oxide, ether, sevoflurane and xenon are so different that it is unlikely they exert their common effects by binding to equivalent proteins in cells, as other drugs do.

And now, Peterson’s plagiarized paragraph:

Curiously, although physicians have been administering general anesthesia for nearly two centuries now, and although they have discovered dozens of different but effective anesthetic compounds, nobody actually knows exactly how anesthesia works. We know that they all shut down body and brain functions in the same order — memory formation first, then pain sensation, then consciousness and, ultimately, breathing — across all animal species, from flies to humans. But nitrous oxide , ether, sevoflurane, and xenon are so very different in their molecular structure that it seems highly unlikely that they function in the same way in their common effects.

I would continue on, but Peterson’s plagiarizing is so ubiquitous and so obvious that yet another proof, on top of the more than a dozen or so in this thread alone, doesn’t seem necessary. Suffice it to say, throughout this entire blog entry Peterson has blatantly stolen someone else’s intellectual property, yet again.