- 126 - 
Per cent of 
knowledge 
having been 
published 
4 
100 $ 
  
70 % 4 
  
  
  
  
. Number of 
T ? periodicais 
a 
> 
m 
AA 
o 
"3 
SCO : 1000 
Efficiency of evaluating periodicals (in chemistry) 
(after ZRB 1980) 
Figure 2 
Another item is the use of publications. The proceedings of the ISPRS Congress 
Hamburg 1980 contain 6,000 pages. A common feature of many papers is that pre- 
vious publications were not considered at all when preparing the manuscripts. 
This statement holds at least for the part of the proceedings covering Com- 
missions I and VI. As a consequence, and extrapolating into the future, many 
papers having been presented at Hamburg 1980 will have been forgotten when pre- 
paring for the next Congress Rio de Janeiro 1984. It may be anticipated that the 
situation is similar with FIG, ICA and IAG. 
This consideration brings us to the question of how many times will a paper be 
read or, exaggerated, what percentage of articles will never be read at all. 
Herein, we should differentiate between browsing = diagonal reading = cross read- 
ing, and reading, and thoroughly reading = studying. Henceforth, we will dis- 
tinguish using just the terms browsing - reading - studying. 
Unfortunately, no results of investigations are known to answer the question 
in full. However, at least studying of papers can factually be measured direct- 
ly in terms of literature references as annexed to articles, and indirectly by 
judging duplication of research efforts. 
The European Economic Commission stated that 50 percent of all scientific and 
technical articles are not referenced at all in follow-up literature (ARNTZ 1977). 
VERNIMB 1971 quotes that scientific publications are studied by nothing but two 
scientists in the average. BROOK 1967 wrote in a report to the US House of Re- 
presentatives that one is struck by the frequency of reinventions of ideas by 
different groups without knowledge of each others work. 
Hothmer 3