Reading the many reports and assessments on the doctoral thesis of the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez Pérez-Castejón; it seems appropriate to shed some light on the subject, especially to guide those who are not familiar with this world of research.
A doctoral thesis, which grants access to the degree of doctor, the highest academic title, is a serious and rigorous work. An arduous task, in which one works for several years. It is carried out under the direction of one or more directors, who supervise, guide and ensure its quality. I do not also say for its cleanliness, because this is taken for granted, as no director would risk their prestige on this issue. Before presenting it, it is deposited at the university. The university submits it to public display, and any claim or anomaly can be expressed during this phase. Furthermore, if there are doubts, the work can be sent for external review, outside the university department where its reading is proposed.
Once this preliminary step has been overcome, it is presented to a panel that grades it, generally composed of three doctors, who must meet minimum requirements, such as years of seniority in the degree of doctor and accredit merits in research. It seems that the quality of the panel that evaluated Pedro Sánchez's thesis is being questioned. Nothing could be further from the truth, if the panel had not met the requirements, it simply would not have been constituted. The fact that, even complying with the regulations, it was composed of young researchers, without great renown, could even harm the doctoral student, as they generally tend to be even tougher than the already established ones.
The panel receives the work well in advance, each member reads and evaluates it beforehand, preparing questions to ask the doctoral student during the defense phase. Any doctor present at the public reading and defense event, even if they are not part of the panel, can ask the doctoral student questions about the work. If the thesis is approved, it is published in Teseo, a public database that collects all these works.
At all times, the work can be consulted and analyzed, even subjected to evaluation by computer programs whose objective is to detect plagiarism, which consists of substantially copying other people's works, passing them off as one's own. But citing the author and the origin, that content included in the thesis and that is not of one's own creation, is no longer plagiarism. In all research works, other authors are cited and part of their content is included, generally to introduce the topic or compare with one's own. These should not exceed approximately 25% of the total, and the rest must be one's own creation, thus avoiding the so-called cut and paste. Sánchez's thesis only has 18% of these coincidences.
A separate comment deserves the accusation of the so-called "self-plagiarism", a term that is not found in the dictionary; this means copying content that is of one's own intellectual creation, if it is yours you do not copy it from anyone, one rarely sees greater foolishness. Many universities require publications, prior to reading, based on the thesis itself and the current regulations even allow as a thesis, a structured compendium of articles written by the doctoral student published in prestigious journals. It could be pointed out, as a formal defect of this thesis, that it is very long, about 350 pages, which makes it difficult to read.
Whoever accuses has to prove it and this thesis has passed all the controls. If any anomaly has been found, report it to the academic authorities or even in the courts of justice. What is not acceptable is to make media accusations, without having made any type of complaint, dragging the good name of the university through the mud, the only social elevator for the most disadvantaged classes.
Eduardo Núñez González is a professor. Doctor in Mathematics and director of several theses.
