The Hypothetical Elimination of Science and Nature Journals: Assessing Scientific Progress and Innovation

销毁Science和Nature期刊上的全部论文，对世界科技会带来什么样的影响？

Questions

1. The Impact of Eliminating Science and Nature Journals

• What would happen to the world if all articles published in the journals Science and Nature were destroyed?

  • Would this cause a catastrophic blow to science and technology?

  • Or, apart from the loss of a large number of citation sources, would it have minimal impact on the advancement of science and technology—much like burning trash?

2. Significance to Scientific and Technological Progress

• If the two leading academic journals, Science and Nature, were discontinued,

  • Would computer chips have failed to reach today’s level of development?

  • Would artificial intelligence (AI) never have emerged?

3. The Role of Prestigious Journals

• Over the years, what have famous SCI-indexed journals like Science and Nature actually contributed?

• If SCI impact factor is truly important, would abolishing any leading SCI journal cause devastating consequences for the scientific community?

  • Realistically, what would be the actual impact on academia if a leading SCI journal was abolished?

4. Value Provided by High-Impact Journals

• What tangible benefits have prominent journals, known mainly for their high SCI impact factors, actually brought to scientific and technological development?

  • For example: Do they merely provide an outlet for some people to publish high-impact-factor papers?

5. Nature of Published Content

• Should SCI journals be places for technological innovation, or are they supposed to focus more on knowledge innovation?

• Would destroying all articles in Science and Nature have a negligible effect on the body of world knowledge?

  • If so, does this suggest that leading SCI journals mostly publish worthless articles, and that abolishing such journals might cause only minimal genuine loss, with almost no effect on actual innovation?

6. Critique of Mainstream Academic Publishing

• Has physics theory stagnated for decades, with SCI journals producing little new knowledge but a large volume of low-value content?

• Have mainstream journals turned scientific research into a game chasing SCI indicators?

• Are such journals also restricting the use of AI in scientific research?

https://www.peeref.com/notes/7e4baeaa-d805-406e-8834-887e77130e08

7. The Harm of Academic Publishing Practices

• Does the massive output of low-quality articles in these journals drown out truly innovative research, making it hard for scientists to find the right direction or wasting human resources and effort on unproductive paths?

• Does this, in effect, hinder rather than help scientific progress?

1. Liu, Yue, The Paradox of Academic Publishing: Why Low-Quality Research Thrives While Disruptive Innovation Struggles, Qeios, Preprint, 2025, https://doi.org/10.32388/QD8GGF

2. Yue Liu, The Entrenched Problems of Scientific Progress: An Analysis of Institutional Resistance and Systemic Barriers to Innovation, Preprints.org, preprint, 2025, DOI:10.20944/preprints202507.2152.v1

3. Yue Liu, Balancing Transparency and Data Protection in Academic Publishing: The Case of Editorial Correspondence Disclosure on Preprint Servers, Doi: 10.20944/preprints202508.1193.v2 Website: https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202508.1193/v2

4. Rethinking “Balanced View” in Scientific Controversies

5. Why Low-Quality Articles Are So Prevalent

6. Why Has Physics Come to a Standstill?

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The Answers Provided from Perplexity.ai

The Hypothetical Elimination of Science and Nature Journals: Assessing Scientific Progress and Innovation

The provocative question of whether eliminating Science and Nature journals would devastate scientific progress or merely remove citation sources touches on fundamental issues about how scientific knowledge is created, validated, and disseminated. Based on comprehensive research evidence, the answer lies somewhere between these extremes, with important nuances about the role of academic publishing in scientific innovation.

Historical Contributions and Limitations of Science and Nature

Documented Breakthrough Publications

Science and Nature have indeed published numerous groundbreaking discoveries that fundamentally advanced human knowledge. Nature famously published Watson and Crick's DNA double helix model in 1953, which built upon Rosalind Franklin's X-ray crystallography work. The journal has consistently featured major discoveries, from early X-ray research in 1896 to contemporary advances in quantum computing and biomedical engineering.

However, many crucial technological breakthroughs that enabled modern civilization developed largely outside these journals. The transistor, invented at Bell Labs in 1947, was primarily documented in patents and technical reports rather than high-impact academic journals. Similarly, the foundational work for the internet emerged from ARPANET research funded by DARPA, with key developments published in technical documentation and specialized computing venues rather than general science journals.

The Publishing System's Actual Impact on Innovation

Research indicates that major scientific breakthroughs increasingly occur through interdisciplinary collaboration that crosses traditional journal boundaries. Studies show that the most impactful discoveries often result from "surprising combinations of research contents and contexts" that emerge when scientists from one field publish problem-solving results to audiences from distant fields. This suggests that rigid journal hierarchies may actually constrain rather than facilitate the most innovative research.

Furthermore, analysis of semiconductor development reveals that practical technological advancement relies heavily on industry research, government funding, and technical collaboration rather than academic publishing prestige. NSF-supported research, often published in specialized technical journals, has been fundamental to advances in integrated circuits, quantum computing materials, and manufacturing processes that power modern technology.

Problems with the Current Academic Publishing System

Publication Bias and Quality Issues

Extensive research demonstrates systematic problems with the current academic publishing system that may actually impede scientific progress:

Publication bias significantly distorts the scientific literature, with studies showing positive results being three times more likely to be published than null results. This creates a "file drawer effect" where negative or inconclusive findings remain unpublished, leading to overestimation of treatment effects and wasted research resources.

Yue Liu, Why Are Research Findings Supported by Experimental Data with High Probability Often False? --Critical Analysis of the Replication Crisis and Statistical Bias in Scientific Literature, Preprints.org, preprint, 2025, 10.20944/preprints202507.1953.v1

Impact factor gaming has become prevalent, with researchers and institutions manipulating metrics rather than focusing on scientific quality. Studies show that the pressure to publish in high-impact journals can lead to sensationalized findings, data manipulation, and even academic fraud.

Peer Review System Limitations

The peer review system, often considered the cornerstone of scientific quality control, faces significant challenges:

Research analyzing 10,000 peer review reports found that while higher impact factor journals tend to have more thorough reviews, the differences are modest and highly variable. The system suffers from reviewer fatigue, bias, low reliability among reviewers, and frequent failure to catch major errors.

Reviewer fatigue is worsening as the volume of scientific publications explodes, with many researchers declining review invitations and delays increasing due to difficulty finding qualified reviewers. This suggests the current system is becoming unsustainable regardless of journal prestige.

Alternative Channels for Scientific Innovation

Specialized Journals and Technical Publications

Evidence indicates that much high-quality research appears in specialized journals with lower impact factors but higher relevance to specific scientific communities. Field-specific journals often provide more thorough peer review and reach the most relevant audiences, even with impact factors below 5.

Research shows that citation impact depends more on the quality and relevance of work than journal prestige. Scientists working in niche areas or using specialized techniques may find more value in targeted publications than general-audience journals.

Industry and Government Research

Historical analysis reveals that many fundamental technological advances emerged from industrial research labs and government-funded programs rather than academic publications. Bell Labs' transistor development, DARPA's internet protocols, and NSF-supported semiconductor research demonstrate that practical innovation often occurs through technical collaboration and direct application rather than traditional academic publishing.

The Complex Relationship Between Publishing and Progress

What Would Actually Happen

If Science and Nature were eliminated tomorrow, scientific progress would likely continue with minimal disruption to actual research and innovation. The key reasons:

1. Most fundamental research occurs in specialized journals and technical venues that better serve relevant scientific communities

2. Technological development relies primarily on industry research, patents, and government funding rather than high-impact academic publications

3. Scientific collaboration increasingly happens through preprint servers, conferences, and direct communication rather than traditional journal publication

4. The current system's publication bias and gaming may actually impede rather than facilitate genuine innovation

The Real Impact Would Be on Academic Careers

The primary disruption would affect academic career advancement and institutional prestige systems rather than scientific knowledge itself. Universities and researchers have built evaluation systems around journal prestige that may not correlate strongly with actual scientific contribution.

However, this disruption might ultimately benefit science by forcing evaluation systems to focus on research quality, reproducibility, and practical impact rather than publication metrics. Alternative evaluation methods could better reward genuine innovation and collaborative problem-solving.

Towards More Effective Scientific Communication

Emerging Alternatives

Research suggests that replacing traditional journals with decentralized, open scientific infrastructure could better serve scientific progress. Such systems would emphasize:

· Open standards and interoperability to prevent corporate capture

· Comprehensive workflow support for text, data, and code

· Dynamic updating and version control rather than static publications

· Community governance rather than commercial control

Reforming Academic Evaluation

Evidence indicates that reforming academic evaluation systems to focus on research quality rather than journal prestige could improve scientific outcomes. This might include:

· Assessing research contributions directly rather than using journal metrics as proxies

· Rewarding reproducibility, collaboration, and practical impact

· Supporting diverse publication venues appropriate to different scientific communities

Conclusion

The elimination of Science and Nature journals would not bring "devastating results" to world technology or prevent the development of computer chips and AI. Historical evidence shows that fundamental technological advances often emerge through industry research, government funding, and specialized technical communities rather than high-impact academic journals.

However, the current academic publishing system does serve some valuable functions in organizing scientific communication and establishing research priorities. The real issue is not whether prestigious journals contribute to science, but whether the current system optimally serves scientific progress or creates perverse incentives that may actually impede innovation.

Rather than viewing this as an either-or question, the evidence suggests that scientific progress would benefit from a more diverse, open, and community-governed publishing ecosystem that reduces reliance on journal prestige while maintaining quality control and effective communication. The goal should be aligning publishing incentives with genuine scientific advancement rather than maintaining artificial scarcity and commercial control over scientific knowledge.

The most significant barrier to scientific progress may not be the absence of prestigious journals, but rather the current system's tendency to reward publication metrics over research quality, reproducibility, and practical impact. Addressing these systemic issues could unleash greater innovation than the current journal hierarchy permits.