Knowbella Tech Founder Talks With Professor Mike Sharples of The Open University
Mike Sharples, PhD is Professor Emeritus of Educational Technology at The Open University in the U.K. and Associate Editor-in Chief of IEEE Transactions in Learning Technologies. One of his main interests is in the possible applications of blockchain technology for learning. Dr. Sharples is also an advisor with Knowbella Tech where he lends his incredible wealth of experience and knowledge to the team. In a recent discussion with Knowbella Tech’s Founder, Jason E. Barkeloo, the two talked about scientific publishing and what its future might hold.
Jason began by asking Mike about the notion that “The Scientific Paper is Obsolete”¹, the title and main supposition of a recent article in The Atlantic by James Somers (2018). In the piece Somers outlines how science is becoming increasingly complex and its ideas increasingly difficult to express. For this reason he argues that computational notebooks such as those developed by Stephen Wolfram at Wolfram Research hold advantages over traditional scientific papers. Somers states that: “Equipping scientists with computational notebooks, or some evolved form of them, might bring their minds to a level with problems now out of reach.”
Jason: What do you make of the idea that the scientific paper is obsolete?
Mike: One could argue the opposite — that we need papers in high quality refereed journals (such as Nature or Science) to communicate the complexity of science. Take the top 5 trending articles in Science: [Viking seafarers may have navigated with legendary crystals; A swarm of black holes may be lurking in our galaxy’s heart; Atoms and antiatoms haven’t crashed Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity — yet; How to put an octopus to sleep — and make cephalopod research more humane; India’s paleontologists fight destruction of its fossil riches]. These are all intriguing, accessible and scientifically valid. And many of them have links to interactive media and extended data. We need more articles like these, not fewer.
Jason: What do you think of the “notebook” approach such as that taken by Stephen Wolfram?
Mike: Wolfram notebooks have a different purpose. They provide a way to embed computation in documents. That’s not new. We were doing it 30 years ago in Poplog Teach files (e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poplog) where you could click on a bit of code and see it run in situ, or edit the code and run it.
In a similar way, some current e-books and MOOC platforms provide ways to embed interactive elements in course material. It would be great to have a standardised way to include interactive elements in scientific articles. To some extent HTML5 serves that purpose. And that’s an open format.
Jason: Thanks for the important perspective, Mike! I’m of the position that paywalled journals keep underserved scientists from the important advancements. I would like to see a hybrid model where there is no paywall, but the peer reviewed quality is kept intact. This is a goal of Knowbella Tech.
If Helix tokens (think Bitcoin) are rewarded to collaborating researchers they might be able to pay their Open Access Charge (APC) or buy paywalled articles. This model may help close the gap between the underserved researchers in Asia, Africa, and Latin America and the West.
Mike: I agree. For example, I welcome the decision by the UK Research Councils that all projects that the Councils fund must publish their results in open peer-reviewed publications.
And the growth of open-access peer-reviewed high quality journals such as PLoS One is very welcome. The Open University contributes to open knowledge through Open Research Online (http://oro.open.ac.uk/) which provides over 30,000 research publications, and also OpenLearn, with over 1000 open-access teaching materials and courses (http://www.open.edu/openlearn/)
As you say, if Helix can be used by under-served researchers to support open-access publication, that would be great!
Jason: Okay Mike, pleasure getting your thoughts as always.
This article was based upon an email exchange between Mike Sharples and Jason E. Barkeloo between April 16–17th 2018 and is printed here with the permission of both parties.
Citations
- Somers, James. “The Scientific Paper is Obsolete”, The Atlantic, (“https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/the-scientific-paper-is-obsolete/556676/”), April 5th 2018
