First, I apologize if mathoverflow is a bad fit for this question, but it is the only place where I can think to get advice from professionals given my circumstance. I'm also sorry about any vagueness in my post since I need to make sure I maintain anonymity – anonymity is also why I can't get advice from folks in my department.
The short story is that I am a graduate student in a math related field and have been reached out to by a faculty member for writing up a paper about something we discussed to be submitted to a low ranking Mathematics journal. The material is very basic, coming very close to being trivial observations, and happens to be of, I suspect, no interest to anyone anywhere. Anyone who cared to prove what we proved would probably be able to do so within a day at most, if the results aren't already well known. At best, I think the results make good homework problems.
Despite this, the faculty member seems excited about it. He works in a field that another faculty member has described as "toxic" to getting a job in academics, which is my ultimate goal, and advised me that I would probably be smart to leave papers in this research topic off my C.V. unless it is accepted to a top-tier journal.
I'm in the strange position of working on this paper because I don't want to alienate him or offend him, but I'm hoping that the paper is rejected just so that my name isn't attached to the paper. This will be my first article submitted for publication, and I'm a little uneasy about even having random editors – who I conceivably could run into in the future – viewing the work.
So, my question to you: is this sort of thing worth getting worked up about? Should I just go along with it, figuring that it is highly unlikely that it will negatively impact my career, or is there some legitimate concern? Is there a chance that publishing trash might help me just because it increases my publication rate?
Best Answer
When all else fails, try honesty.
I don't mean that you have to tell the professor to his face that you think his field is toxic and that the paper is garbage. But if your honest opinion is that the paper is too trivial to be worth publishing and that you're worried that it might hurt your career, then I would tell the professor that.
If you can suppress your name from the paper more easily, just by declining to work on it, then by all means do that. But it sounds like you've already worked on the paper and can't extricate yourself that easily at this point. In that case I'd recommend just telling the professor that you have had second thoughts and would like to remove your name from the paper, and explain why. The fact that you're a student and he's a professor makes this a scarier prospect, but I don't think your difference in social status should stop you from giving your honest professional opinion on the quality of the work. Intellectual honesty is what we are all striving for in our profession, after all. What's the point in being a scholar if you have to sacrifice honesty?
And maybe you're wrong after all and the paper is more interesting than you think. You won't find this out unless you give the professor an opportunity to openly defend the paper against honest criticism.
Honesty is so rare that it tends to confuse people, who are more accustomed to dealing with lies and excuses than with the straight dope. I know from experience that being honest does risk being misunderstood by people who assume that I can't possibly be telling the truth, so there is some risk of misunderstanding. In the long run, though, I believe that developing a reputation for honesty pays off handsomely, in terms of inner peace if nothing else.