1945: Scientific Paper Graph Quality - Revision history

Duralumin-here: /* Transcript */

2025-11-12T22:45:40Z

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172.71.242.2: /* Explanation */

2024-03-18T14:28:24Z

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2022-05-04T21:00:10Z

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Ex Kay Cee Dee at 20:58, 4 May 2022

2022-05-04T20:58:10Z

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2022-05-04T20:53:27Z

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Ex Kay Cee Dee at 20:49, 4 May 2022

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Davidy22: Reverted edits by X. K. C. D. (talk) to last revision by Sqrt-1

2022-05-04T01:59:04Z

Reverted edits by X. K. C. D. (talk) to last revision by Sqrt-1

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X. K. C. D. at 00:58, 4 May 2022

2022-05-04T00:58:28Z

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Sqrt-1: /* Transcript */ What do you mean it’s incomplete?

2020-12-14T03:43:53Z

‎Transcript: What do you mean it’s incomplete?

Lettherebedarklight: /* Transcript */

2020-11-12T14:11:21Z

‎Transcript

@@ Line 15: / Line 15: @@
 ==Transcript==
-:[Heading on top of the graph:]
+:[Title above a graph:]
 :'''General quality of charts and graphs in scientific papers'''
+:[A graph is shown. The y-axis is labeled "bad" at the origin and "good" near the arrowhead at its top. The x-axis is a timeline labeled with each decade from the 1950s to the 2010s.]
-:[A graph is shown with the y-axis on the origin labeled "bad", on the arrowhead labeled "good", and the x-axis being a timeline labeled with decades from 1950s to 2010s.]
+:[The graph has a mostly positive slope, except that it makes a deep U shape from the early 1990s (perhaps 1993) through around 2015. This portion has a grey background and is labeled the "PowerPoint/MSPaint era".]
 {{comic discussion}}

@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 {{w|Microsoft_PowerPoint#Use_it_less|Critics of PowerPoint}}, such as {{w|Edward_Tufte#Criticism_of_PowerPoint|Edward Tufte}}, have argued that the software is ill-suited for reporting scientific analyses. Many scientific journals nowadays explicitly forbid the use of PowerPoint in their [https://www.sciencemag.org/site/feature/contribinfo/prep/prep_revfigs.xhtml instructions for authors.] It can be argued that other software specifically built for this task - and techniques to do so - have been refined over time, leading to a rise in graph quality outside the PowerPoint/MSPaint era (though see discussion).
-The title text states that among the bad quality graphs, the ones “with qualitative, vaguely-labeled axes and very little actual data” are the worst. While this may indicate that the problem with PowerPoint era graphs is that they seem to focus on getting the point across (qualitative as in “you get the idea”) over accuracy (little actual data), this is more [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HypocriticalHumor hypocritical humor] on Randall's part, as the comic itself features exactly that sort of lambasted graph. The vertical axis labeled “good” and “bad” is entirely qualitative, the horizontal axis manages to use numbers and still be vague by labeling the area between the ticks as decades instead of labeling the ticks, the definition of what constitutes the ‘PowerPoint / MSPaint era’ is entirely unclear, and it is doubtful that any actual data was used to make the graph – certainly there are no actual data points indicated. Its quality is doubtful, and it might represent more of an impression, or opinion, than an actual fact.
+The title text states that among the bad quality graphs, the ones “with qualitative, vaguely-labeled axes and very little actual data” are the worst. While this may indicate that the problem with PowerPoint era graphs is that they seem to focus on getting the point across (qualitative as in “you get the idea”) over accuracy (little actual data), this is more {{tvtropes|HypocriticalHumor|hypocritical humor}} on Randall's part, as the comic itself features exactly that sort of lambasted graph. The vertical axis labeled “good” and “bad” is entirely qualitative, the horizontal axis manages to use numbers and still be vague by labeling the area between the ticks as decades instead of labeling the ticks, the definition of what constitutes the ‘PowerPoint / MSPaint era’ is entirely unclear, and it is doubtful that any actual data was used to make the graph – certainly there are no actual data points indicated. Its quality is doubtful, and it might represent more of an impression, or opinion, than an actual fact.
 ==Transcript==

← Older revision		Revision as of 03:43, 14 December 2020
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	==Transcript==		==Transcript==
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	:[Heading on top of the graph:]		:[Heading on top of the graph:]

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 ==Transcript==
 {{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
 :'''General quality of charts and graphs in scientific papers'''