View source for SCIgen

{{Short description|Random text generating software}}
{{Infobox software
|name                       = SCIgen
|logo                       =
|screenshot                 =
|caption                    =
|collapsible                =
|author                     =
|developer                  =
|released                   = <!-- {{Start date|YYYY|MM|DD}} -->
|latest release version     =
|latest release date        = <!-- {{Start date and age|YYYY|MM|DD}} -->
|latest preview version     =
|latest preview date        = <!-- {{Start date and age|YYYY|MM|DD}} -->
|programming language       = [[Perl]]
|operating system           =
|platform                   =
|size                       =
|language                   = English
|genre                      = [[Paper generator]]
|license                    = [[GNU General Public License]]
|website                    = http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/
}}

'''SCIgen''' is a [[paper generator]] that uses [[context-free grammar]] to randomly generate [[nonsense]] in the form of [[computer science]] [[scientific paper|research papers]]. Its original data source was a collection of computer science papers downloaded from [[CiteSeer]]. All elements of the papers are formed, including graphs, diagrams, and [[citation]]s. Created by scientists at the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]], its stated aim is "to maximize amusement, rather than coherence."<ref>[http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/#about SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator]</ref> Originally created in 2005 to expose the lack of scrutiny of submissions to conferences, the generator subsequently became used, primarily by Chinese academics, to create large numbers of fraudulent conference submissions, leading to the retraction of 122 SCIgen generated papers and the creation of detection software to combat its use.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last1=Bohannon|first1=John|date=2015-03-27|title=Hoax-detecting software spots fake papers|url=https://www.science.org/content/article/hoax-detecting-software-spots-fake-papers|access-date=2020-09-28|website=Science {{!}} AAAS|language=en|quote=Rather than being created as pranks, it seems that many of the fake papers were coming from China where they were "bought by academics and students" to pad their publication records, says the lead researcher behind the investigation, Cyril Labbé, a computer scientist at Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble, France.}}</ref>

==Sample output==
Opening [[abstract (summary)|abstract]] of ''Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy'':<ref name="rooter">{{cite web
 | url = http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/rooter.pdf
 | title = Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy
 | author = Stribling, Jeremy |author2=Aguayo, Daniel |author3=Krohn, Maxwell
 }}</ref>
{{blockquote
 | Many physicists would agree that, had it not been for congestion control, the evaluation of web browsers might never have occurred. In fact, few hackers worldwide would disagree with the essential unification of voice-over-IP and public/private key pair. In order to solve this riddle, we confirm that SMPs can be made stochastic, cacheable, and interposable.}}

==Prominent results==
In 2005, a paper generated by SCIgen, ''Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy'', was accepted as a non-reviewed paper to the 2005 [[WMSCI|World Multiconference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics]] (WMSCI) and the authors were invited to speak. The authors of SCIgen described their hoax on their website, and it soon received great publicity when picked up by [[Slashdot]]. WMSCI withdrew their invitation, but the SCIgen team went anyway, renting space in the hotel separately from the conference and delivering a series of randomly generated talks on their own "track". The organizer of these WMSCI conferences is Professor Nagib Callaos. From 2000 until 2005, the WMSCI was also sponsored by the [[Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers]].<ref>Heinrich Zankl: ''Der Science-Generator- ein geniales Publikationsprogramm''. In W.Hömberg, E.Roloff (Herausgeber): ''Jahrbuch der Marginalistik IV:'' Lit-Verlag. Münster . 2016 S. 60–67. {{ISBN|978-3-643-99793-7}}</ref> The IEEE stopped granting sponsorship to Callaos from 2006 to 2008.

Submitting the paper was a deliberate attempt to embarrass WMSCI, which the authors claim accepts low-quality papers and sends unsolicited requests for submissions in bulk to academics. As the SCIgen website states:{{blockquote
 | One useful purpose for such a program is to auto-generate submissions to conferences that you suspect might have very low submission standards. A prime example, which you may recognize from spam in your inbox, is SCI/IIIS and its dozens of co-located conferences (check out the very broad conference description on the WMSCI 2005 website).
 | About SCIgen<ref>{{cite web | url = http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/ | title = SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator | publisher = MIT }}</ref>}}

Computing writer [[Stan Kelly-Bootle]] noted in ''[[ACM Queue]]'' that many sentences in the "Rooter" paper were individually plausible, which he regarded as posing a problem for automated detection of hoax articles. He suggested that even human readers might be taken in by the effective use of jargon ("The pun on root/router is par for MIT-graduate humor, and at least one occurrence of methodology is mandatory") and attribute the paper's apparent incoherence to their own limited knowledge. His conclusion was that "a reliable gibberish filter requires a careful holistic review by several peer domain experts".<ref>{{cite journal |author=Stan Kelly-Bootle |author-link=Stan Kelly-Bootle |date=July–August 2005 |title=Call that gibberish? |journal=[[ACM Queue]] |volume=3 |issue=6 |doi=10.1145/1080862.1080884 |page=64 |doi-access=free }}</ref>

=== Schlangemann {{anchor|Schlangemann}} ===
The [[pseudonym]] "Herbert Schlangemann" was used to publish fake scientific articles in international conferences that claimed to practice [[Scholarly peer review|peer review]]. The name is taken from the Swedish short film ''[[Der Schlangemann]]''.
* In 2008, in response to a [[Spam (electronic)|series]] of Call-for-Paper [[e-mail]]s, SCIgen was used to generate a false [[academic publishing|scientific paper]] titled ''Towards the Simulation of E-Commerce'', using "Herbert Schlangemann" as the author. The article was accepted at the ''2008 International Conference on Computer Science and Software Engineering (CSSE 2008)'', co-sponsored by the [[IEEE]], to be held in [[Wuhan, China]], and the author was invited to be a session chair on grounds of his fictional [[Curriculum Vitae]].<ref>{{cite web | title = CSSE Conference Program | url = https://sites.google.com/site/herbertschlangemann/Home/csse2008_program.pdf?attredirects=0 }}</ref> The official review comment: "This paper presents cooperative technology and classical Communication. In conclusion, the result shows that though the much-touted amphibious algorithm for the refinement of randomized algorithms is impossible, the well-known client-server algorithm for the analysis of voice-over-IP by Kumar and Raman runs in _(n) time. The authors can clearly identify important features of visualization of DHTs and analyze them insightfully. It is recommended that the authors should develop ideas more cogently, organizes them more logically, and connects them with clear transitions." The paper was available for a short time in the [[IEEE]] Xplore Database, but was then removed. The entire story is described in the official "Herbert Schlangemann" [[blog]],<ref name="Schlangemann">{{cite web | title = The official Herbert Schlangemann Blog, The whole story behind the paper "Towards the Simulation of E-Commerce" | url = http://diehimmelistschoen.blogspot.com/ }}</ref> and it also received attention in [[Slashdot]]<ref>{{cite news
| author = kdawson
| date = December 24, 2008
| title = Software-Generated Paper Accepted At IEEE Conference
| journal = Slashdot
| publisher = VA Linux Systems Japan
| url = http://entertainment.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/23/2321242
| access-date = May 5, 2009
}}</ref> and the German-language technology-news site Heise Online.<ref>{{cite news
| author = Peter-Michael Ziegler
| date = December 26, 2008
| title = Dr. Herbert Schlangemann - oder die Geschichte eines pseudowissenschaftlichen Nonsens-Papiers (in German)
| journal = Heise Online
| publisher = Heise Zeitschriften Verlag
| url = http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Dr-Herbert-Schlangemann-oder-die-Geschichte-eines-pseudowissenschaftlichen-Nonsens-Papiers--/meldung/120927
| access-date = May 5, 2009
}}</ref><ref>[http://www.heise.de Heise Online] webpage (in German)</ref>
* In 2009, the same incident happened and Herbert Schlangemann's latest fake paper ''PlusPug: A Methodology for the Improvement of Local-Area Networks'' was accepted for oral presentation at the ''2009 International Conference on e-Business and Information System Security (EBISS 2009)'', also co-sponsored by [[IEEE]], to be held again in [[Wuhan, China]].<ref name="Schlangemann"/>

In all cases, the published papers were withdrawn from the conferences' proceedings, and the conference organizing committee as well as the names of the keynote speakers were removed from their websites.

===List of works with notable acceptance===

==== In conferences ====
{{see also|Predatory conference}}
* Rob Thomas: ''Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy'', 2005 for WMSCI (see above)
* Mathias Uslar's paper was accepted to the IPSI-BG conference.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.mwise.de/blog/index.php/2005/12/29/scigen-for-scientific-research-a-case-study | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090615135409/http://www.mwise.de/blog/index.php/2005/12/29/scigen-for-scientific-research-a-case-study | archive-date = 2009-06-15 | title = Mathias Uslar's paper. }}</ref>
* Professor [[Genco Gulan]] published a paper in the 3rd International Symposium of Interactive Media Design.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/blog/index.php?entry=entry060414-130910 | title = About Genco Gulan's paper. }}</ref>
*{{anchor|How many SCIgen papers in Computer Science?}} A 2013 [[scientometrics]] paper demonstrated that at least 85 SCIgen papers have been published by [[IEEE]] and [[Springer Science+Business Media|Springer]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/71/35/55/PDF/0-FakeDetectionSci-Perso.pdf |title=Duplicate and Fake Publications in the Scientific Literature : How many SCIgen papers in Computer Science? |publisher=Hal.archives-ouvertes.fr |access-date=2014-05-15}}</ref> Over 120 SCIgen papers were removed according to this research.<ref>{{cite news|title=Publishers withdraw more than 120 gibberish papers|url=http://www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763|access-date=25 February 2014|newspaper=Nature|date=24 February 2014}}</ref>

==== In journals ====
* {{anchor|Elsevier}}Students at Iran's [[Sharif University of Technology]] published a paper in [[Elsevier]]'s ''Journal of Applied Mathematics and Computation''.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://ce.sharif.edu/~ghodsi/soft-group/misc/AMC-paper.pdf | title = Cooperative, Compact Algorithms for Randomized Algorithms | author = Rohollah Mosallahnezhad | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20091229022456/http://ce.sharif.edu/~ghodsi/soft-group/misc/AMC-paper.pdf | archive-date = 2009-12-29 }}</ref>  The students wrote under the surname "MosallahNejad", which translates literally from [[Persian language]] (in spite of not being a traditional [[Persian name]]) as "from an Armed Breed".  The paper was subsequently removed when the publishers were informed that it was a joke paper.<ref>{{citation | doi = 10.1016/j.amc.2007.03.011 | title = REMOVED: Cooperative, compact algorithms for randomized algorithms | journal = Applied Mathematics and Computation | author = Rohollah Mosallahnezhad | year = 2007 }}</ref>
* {{anchor|Russia}}[[Mikhail Gelfand]] published a translation of the "Rooter" article in the Russian-language ''Journal of Scientific Publications of Aspirants and Doctorants'' in August 2008. Gelfand was protesting against the journal, which was apparently not peer-reviewed and was being used by Russian PhD candidates to publish in an "[[Academic ranks in Russia|accredited]]" scientific journal, charging them 4000 Rubles to do so. The accreditation was revoked two weeks later.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.sciencepresse.qc.ca/actualite/2009/09/08/ordinateur-ecrit-mieux-tien|title=Mon ordinateur écrit mieux que le tien!|date=8 September 2009|work=Agence Science-Presse|language=fr|access-date=4 October 2011|location=Canada}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/blog/index.php?entry=entry090108-122533|title=Rooter invades Russia|date=8 January 2009|work=SCIgen|access-date=4 October 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140403061348/https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/blog/index.php?entry=entry090108-122533|archive-date=2014-04-03|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.ntv.ru/novosti/141780/|script-title=ru:Группа отечественных ученых поставила эксперимент — смешала сложные термины случайным образом, а полученный текст отослала в один из научных журналов|last=Malozemov|first=Sergei|date=7 October 2008|work=NTV|language=ru|access-date=4 October 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Feedback|date=15 August 2009|work=New Scientist}}</ref> (See [[Dissernet]] for related information.)
*[[Springer Science+Business Media#History|Springer Science+Business Media]] and IEEE were also the subject of similar pranks.

=== Spoofing Google Scholar and ''h''-index calculators ===

Refereeing performed on behalf of the [[Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers]] has also been subject to criticism after fake papers were discovered in conference publications, most notably by Labbé and a researcher using the pseudonym of [[#Schlangemann|Schlangemann]].<ref>{{cite journal | first1 = Cyril | last1= Labbé | first2 = Dominique | last2 = Labbé |date= 2013 |title= Duplicate and fake publications in the scientific literature: how many SCIgen papers in computer science?|journal= Scientometrics |volume= 94|issue= 1|pages= 379–396 | doi=10.1007/s11192-012-0781-y| s2cid= 6889400 | url= https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00641906 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://retractionwatch.com/2014/02/24/springer-ieee-withdrawing-more-than-120-nonsense-papers/ |title=Springer, IEEE withdrawing more than 120 nonsense papers |last=Oransky |first=Ivan |date=February 24, 2014 |website=retractionwatch.com |publisher=WordPress.com |access-date=April 29, 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | first = Paul Colin | last= de Gloucester |date= 2013 |title= Referees Often Miss Obvious Errors in Computer and Electronic Publications|url= http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/bjYcIWGse8G2J3TVmMBD/full |journal= Accountability in Research: Policies and Quality Assurance |volume= 20|issue= 3|pages= 143–166 |doi=10.1080/08989621.2013.788379| pmid= 23672521 | bibcode= 2013ARPQ...20..143D | s2cid= 42975675 |url-access= subscription }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://beta.slashdot.org/story/111963 |title=Software-Generated Paper Accepted At IEEE Conference |last=Dawson |first=K. |date=December 23, 2008 |website=slashdot.org |publisher=Dice |access-date=April 29, 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://linux.slashdot.jp/story/08/12/24/0750222/IEEE%E3%82%AB%E3%83%B3%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%83%AC%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B9%E3%80%81%E8%87%AA%E5%8B%95%E7%94%9F%E6%88%90%E3%81%AE%E3%83%8B%E3%82%BB%E8%AB%96%E6%96%87%E3%82%92%E3%82%A2%E3%82%AF%E3%82%BB%E3%83%97%E3%83%88 |title=IEEEカンファレンス、自動生成のニセ論文をアクセプト |last=Hatta |first=Masayuki |date=December 24, 2008 |website=slashdot.jp |publisher=OSDN Corporation |language=Japanese |access-date=April 29, 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://heise.de/-192451 |title=Dr. Herbert Schlangemann - oder die Geschichte eines pseudowissenschaftlichen Nonsens-Papiers |last=Ziegler |first=Peter-Michael |date=December 26, 2008 |website=heise.de |publisher=Heise Zeitschriften Verlag |language=German |access-date=April 29, 2014}}</ref>

Cyril Labbé from [[Joseph Fourier University|Grenoble University]] demonstrated the vulnerability of [[h-index|''h''-index]] calculations based on [[Google Scholar]] output by feeding it a large set of SCIgen-generated documents that were citing each other, effectively an academic [[link farm]], in a 2010 paper. Using this method the author managed to rank "Ike Antkare" ahead of [[Albert Einstein]] for instance.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://rr.liglab.fr/research_report/RR-LIG-008.pdf |title=Les rapports de recherche du LIG |publisher=Rr.liglab.fr |access-date=2014-05-15}}</ref>

=== 2013 retractions ===
In 2013, over 122 published conference papers created by SCIgen were retracted by ''[[Springer Science+Business Media|Springer]]'' and the IEEE. Unlike previous submissions that were intended to be pranks, this submission were largely made by Chinese academics, who were using SCIgen papers to boost their publication record.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Van Noorden|first=Richard|title=Publishers withdraw more than 120 gibberish papers|url=http://www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763|journal=Nature News|year=2014|language=en|doi=10.1038/nature.2014.14763|doi-access=free}}</ref>

=== SciDetect ===
In 2015, SciDetect was released by ''Springer''. This software, developed by Cyril Labbé, is designed to automatically detect papers generated by SCIgen.<ref name=":0" />

=== 2021 report ===
In 2021, a study was published on 243 SCIgen papers that had been published in the academic literature. They found that SCIgen papers made up 75 per million papers (<{{spaces}}0.01%) in information science, and that only a small fraction of the detected papers had been dealt with.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Cabanac|first1=Guillaume|last2=Labbé|first2=Cyril|date=2021-05-25|title=Prevalence of nonsensical algorithmically generated papers in the scientific literature|journal=Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology|volume=72|issue=12|language=en|pages=1461–1476|doi=10.1002/asi.24495|s2cid=236374033|issn=2330-1635|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Noorden|first=Richard Van|date=2021-05-27|title=Hundreds of gibberish papers still lurk in the scientific literature|url=https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01436-7|journal=Nature|language=en|volume=594|issue=7862|pages=160–161|doi=10.1038/d41586-021-01436-7|pmid=34045760|bibcode=2021Natur.594..160V|s2cid=235232305|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

== See also ==
{{Portal|Free and open-source software}}
{{columns-list|colwidth=22em|
* [[Academic conference]]
* [[Bogdanov affair]]
* [[Derailment (thought disorder)]]
* [[Grievance studies affair]]
* [[Infinite monkey theorem]]
* [[List of scholarly publishing hoaxes]]
* [[Paper generator]]
* [[Parody generator]]
* [[Postmodernism Generator]]
* [[Sokal affair]]
* [[The Engine]]
* [[Turing test]]
* ''[[Get me off your fucking mailing list]]''
* ''[[Who's Afraid of Peer Review?]]''
}}

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==Further reading==
*{{cite journal
| last        = Ball
| first       = Philip
| title       = Computer conference welcomes gobbledegook paper
| journal     = [[Nature (journal)|Nature]]
| volume      = 434
| page       = 946
| doi         = 10.1038/nature03653
| pmid        = 15846311
| year        = 2005
| issue        = 7036
| bibcode = 2005Natur.434..946B
| doi-access= free
}}
* {{cite news
| author        = kdawson
| date        = 24 December 2008
| title       = Software-Generated Paper Accepted At IEEE Conference
| journal     = Slashdot
| publisher   = VA Linux Systems Japan
| url         = http://entertainment.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/23/2321242
| access-date  = 5 May 2009
}}
*{{cite news
| author      = Peter-Michael Ziegler
| date        = 26 December 2008
| title       = Dr. Herbert Schlangemann - oder die Geschichte eines pseudowissenschaftlichen Nonsens-Papiers (in German)
| journal     = Heise Online
| publisher   = Heise Zeitschriften Verlag
| url         = http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Dr-Herbert-Schlangemann-oder-die-Geschichte-eines-pseudowissenschaftlichen-Nonsens-Papiers--/meldung/120927
| access-date  = 5 May 2009
}}

==External links==
* [https://464020df-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.googlegroups.com/site/herbertschlangemann/Home/Herbert_Schlangemann_Towards_the_Simulation_of_E_Commerce.pdf?attachauth=ANoY7crogsXNQkZ_BjTjTUG5LSkGxbbvSd8HCdSWYbSbY7C2JUXcSwcfMFQbiwB_mqINkB7AV4iCgubbfqppRqmwErXg3YLE3RFurJJ_vnmHBrFtQ6j_EOystSjshk-moLWq1B7yeMFuBqwFYpg6-hR870roEg43HP0K6SwEzEjKxFWrqYGkgyGo6RIjKZv5AwZscGQdFAdu2RGy5x5Rvgd3NRnlLyxEMa-W5fsGeqJcjd_4kyT8hiPprR-9Uq_fv0QDJU8c01m5jtRmgNfpnpfdU7_ecWdJdM8Th904IKYYFPJkHCw-kek%3D&attredirects=0 Copy of the fake paper: Towards the Simulation of E-Commerce by Herbert Schlangemann]
* [http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/ SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator]
* [http://scigendetection.imag.fr/ SCIgen detection website]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Scigen}}
[[Category:Academic scandals]]
[[Category:Applications of artificial intelligence]]
[[Category:Formal languages]]
[[Category:Hoaxes in science]]
[[Category:Natural language generation]]
[[Category:Academic publishing]]