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Since there have been books, there has been a need to get rid of them. From powerful magical formulae and heretical wisdom to the early drafts of poetry, authorities and writers tried to remove certain texts from circulation, or tried to inhibit or steer their reception. In the first part, this article gives a brief overview of forms of book-disposal, voluntary and involuntary, in antiquity and points to their significance for Augustine of Hippo in particular. In a second section, the article features Augustine's Revisions (Retractationes), a commentary on his own literary production and an innovative effort to gain control over the reception and interpretation of his own works. In this late retrospection, Augustine employs the persona of a self-critical author-fallible and pressed by the duties of his office but always in pursuit of God's truth-that allows him to reconfigure his authorial past in relation to himself, his texts, and his audience. The article will trace the implications of Augustine's self-fashioning for the recurrent problem of controlling the reception and interpretation of written works., Author(s): Kai Preuß [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.5330.5, 0000 0001 2107 3311, Department Geschichte, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, , Raum 2.024, Kochstr. 4 (Postfach 8), 91054, Erlangen, Germany Introduction It is the [...]

The article is a defense of the retraction of Lawrence M. Mead's 'Poverty and Culture' from the journal Society in 2020. Four reasons for retraction are adduced: the unreliable content; the faulty review process; the redundancy of the article in relation to previous articles by Mead; and the defamation of racial and national groups. The article discusses the ethics of retraction in general, arguing that retraction is an indispensable procedure for correcting errors and maintaining high academic standards. The article also seeks to allay the apprehension that retraction is contrary to the spirit of free speech. Since a statement of retraction is a form of discourse and an exercise of academic judgment by the editors, retraction is an instance, not a violation, of free speech., Author(s): Daniel Gordon [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.266683.f, 0000 0001 2166 5835, University of Massachusetts Amherst, , Amherst, MA, USA Background on the Mead Retraction On July 21, 2020, Society [...]

Retractions by journals are an essential part of scholarship to deal with fraud and false research. But retractions also pose a threat to academic freedom when they are used to censor unpopular views under political pressure. Decisions to retract need to be made by the correct people (the journal editors), in the correct manner (following established due process procedures), and for the correct reasons (cases of fraudulent deception, rather than mere errors of facts or ideology)., Author(s): John K. Wilson [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) Evanston, USA The right to conduct and publish research is a core component of academic freedom, and this right is endangered whenever [...]

INTRODUCTION 316 I. REASONS FOR THE DUTY 319 II. THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF THE DUTY 323 III. THE EXISTING DUTY NOT TO CONTINUE DISPLAYING POSTS ON PHYSICAL PROPERTY 325 IV. SCOPE [...], Say something I wrote about you online (in a newspaper, a blog, or a social media page) turns out to be false and defamatory. Assume I wasn 't culpable when I first posted it, but now I'm on notice of the error. Am I liable for defamation if I fail to remove or correct the erroneous material? Surprisingly, courts haven't settled on an answer, and scholars haven't focused on the question. Libel law is stuck in a time when newspapers left the publisher's control as soon as they are printed--even though now an article or a post can be seen on the publisher's site (and can do enduring damage) for years to come. This Article also deals with a related question: Say I wrote about your having been indicted for a crime, but montlis or years later you are acquitted; am I liable for defamation if I fail to update the original story to reflect the new legal developments? That too is legally unresolved. This Article argues that existing common-law principles allow for a limited duty to stop hosting material that one learns is defamatory; and that legislatures can further supplement that duty.

Colleagues with critiques want the same thing as you: to understand the world. Colleagues with critiques want the same thing as you: to understand the world., Author(s): Ben de Haas Author Affiliations: What my retraction taught me In the middle of the pandemic, I got an e-mail asking whether I had access to data from the [...]

A story of how the news coverage of a coal mine accident in Sago went wrong when journalists incorrectly reported the miners' survival and how later they corrected the mishandled story by turning it into a positive story of human bravery, sacrifice, survival, and hope for the future is illustrated.

The latest science news, in brief. The latest science news, in brief., Author Affiliations: Dinosaur retraction, Neanderthal pain and EU budget woe This fossil trapped in amber was thought to be a dinosaur but is probably a lizard. Credit: Lida Xing Amber [...]

The scientific community should agree on the essential information to be provided when pulling a paper from the scientific literature. The scientific community should agree on the essential information to be provided when pulling a paper from the scientific literature., Author(s): Quan-Hoang Vuong Author Affiliations: Reform retractions to make them more transparent This month, both The New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet retracted controversial studies testing COVID-19 treatments. [...]

Mistakes are part of science. But setting the record straight promptly and clearly can help to avoid a career blot., Author(s): Virginia Gewin [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) Virginia Gewin is a freelance writer in Portland, Oregon., After 18 months of complex testing and re-testing, Pamela Ronald became certain that she [...]

BECAUSE HUMAN KNOWLEDGE is by definition fallible, correction remains a necessity. An understanding of how error correction works in the scientific literature helps rebut fears that the veracity of the [...]

Checking before publication reduces errors. What's more, both sources and readers favor the idea.

Researchers rapidly corrected finding through discussions on social media and preprints. Researchers rapidly corrected finding through discussions on social media and preprints., Author(s): Ewen Callaway Author Affiliations: Geneticists retract study suggesting first CRISPR babies might die early Errors in techniques for tracking down genetic mutations led to erroneous results in a now-retracted [...]

Study of six newspapers finds mistakes and variety of ways to address errors An editorial this summer in one of the nation's biggest newspapers stated that the Persian Gulf War [...]

Accuracy falls victim to lost redundancy, ineffective copy systems First, get it right. After that, your lead may be awkwardly long, your quotes bland, your prose pedestrian, your transitions abrupt, [...]

On page 630 of our Summer 2000 issue (74:3), the final three paragraphs in Pierre L. Horn's review of Elie Wiesel's memoir And the Sea Is Never Full were badly [...]

In the review of Harold Holzer's book, Lincoln Seen and Heard, published in the December 2000 issue of the journal, the title was inadvertently transposed. We apologize for the error. [...]

New York Times Corrections, May 18 'An article on April 30 about the reaction of scientists at the Smithsonian Institution to plans by its director, Lawrence M. Small, to close [...]

The following words were printed incorrectly in the article by Naomi Koltun-Fromm in HTR 94:2, 'Yokes of the Holy-Ones: The Embodiment of a Christan Vocation.' The correct forms should read: [...]

In 'Development of scales to measure dietary acculturation among Chinese-Americans and Chinese-Canadians' by Jessie A. Satia, PhD, MPH, and colleagues (May, 2001, P. 548), Table 2 appeared incorrectly. Below is [...]

The article 'Polymer-Polymer Miscibility Study for Plastic Gradient Index Optical Fiber,' which appeared in the September 2000 issue of Polymer Engineering & Science, Vol. 40, pp. 1996-2006, lists Bongsoo Lee, [...]