Timeline for Is a research thesis (report) with zero contribution to human knowledge acceptable?
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| Sep 10, 2013 at 11:35 | comment | added | ThomasH | @Jeremy It's Zobel's use of the word "negative" that's the problem, especially since he talks about "negative result". As JeffE remarked above, negative result and no result are two different things. If you prove X doesn't hold (negative result), you've advanced human knowledge and made an intellectual contribution. But if you haven't proven whether X holds or not (no result) then you haven't made a contribution. Yes, you might be unlucky and research down a dead end where it turns out you can't prove X either way, but if you show why you can't prove X, that is still a contribution | |
| Sep 8, 2013 at 14:12 | comment | added | J.y B.y | You assert "A thesis is expected to make an intellectual contribution", which clashes with Zobel's statement "even if good results are not achieved, the thesis should pass if you have shown the ability to undertake high-quality research". Sorry if my use of the term "negative" sent you off-track: I will rephrase. | |
| Sep 7, 2013 at 18:13 | history | edited | debray | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 88 characters in body
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| Sep 7, 2013 at 17:57 | history | answered | debray | CC BY-SA 3.0 |