SCIENTIFIC RACE
D. J. deS. Price
. . . Papers which make the same citations have an increased likelihood of doing the same work. Thus, increasing the efficiency of the rate at which one can make priority claims automatically seems to produce a higher incidence of such claims or at least of the raw material for them. There is a feedback working to minimize part of the advantage gained by rapid publication.
I therefore arrive at the conclusion that a scientific race to get there first is tremendously wasteful, and that anything that lessens the reward for such achievement is good. Thus it is perhaps a good thing to deprive the authors of their chance to get their names on the paper. It might be made sufficient honor and reward that they are allowed to play with the team.
