Google as a tool for measuring scientists' fame
21 May 2004
Scientists at Clarkson University in the USA are shortly to publish a research document, using the Google search engine to establish a mathematical decision of fame.
The researchers have attempted also to determine a link between fame and scientific merit, in their study of the relative levels of "fame" - quantified in Google hits - achieved by different scientists.
The new study picks up on a previous study published by Vwani Roychowdhury and Mikhail Simkin of UCLA who used Google to determine the levels of fame and merit (defined as the number of enemy planes shot down) of First World War pilots.
Adopting a measure of scientific merit based on the number of papers posted by writers on electronic archives, the Clarkson researchers claim to have found "definitive mathematical relationships" between fame and merit - within the scientific world.
" For whatever reason, scientists are simply not known to the general public", Daniel ben-Avraham - one of the Clarkson team - admitted.
" The popularity of even truly famous scientists pales in comparison with other public figures", colleague Hernan Rozenfeld added.
Only Albert Einstein topped a million hits in the study, (1,660,000), with Isaac Newton second (902,000 hits) and Galileo a distant third (245,000 hits).
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