On UCSC’s outrageous mass destruction of books

Science libraries are fantastically helpful for tracking down the origins of error in scientific thinking. For example, the female doctor who gave PMS its name also gave a recommended treatment, though she admitted that it was uncertain why the treatment worked. A later book - a collection of papers, iirc, said "yeah that old treatment didn't actually work," but added nothing of substance to provide better treatments.

Just a few weeks ago the caller to a Science Friday called to complain about male whiners who couldn't tolerate the side effects of the male pill they were trialing:

  Jessica: Hi, [...]  I tried about six 
  different birth controls. Depo-Provera made me 
  manic and suicidal, yet that's still on the 
  market and considered acceptable for women to 
  take. [...]  It's okay that I was suicidal, 
  and that that form of birth control is still 
  on the market. [...]

- http://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/looking-beyond-condoms...

Maybe if doctors spent more time in science libraries iatrogenic illness wouldn't be such a problem.

Recently, I went to my University's library with an actual mission related to my research for the first time since I came here 17 years ago. On the shelf near the book I water was supposed to be (they couldn't find it and started a "system wide search for me") were a ton of stupid "pop science" versions of similar material, many of which fundamentally misunderstood the underlying algorithms. On the shelf was one great book: one that was referred to often, one which I knew had the correct algorithms inside--information you hardly ever find covered these days online, as this isn't a particularly "fun" topic--and yet it had a slip in it... as no one was checking it out the Library was intending to garbage collect it :/. They put the slip in there five years after the last person checked it out, and it had been sitting in the book for the past three years. Like, I understand why their data science would tell them "this book is wasting space on our shelves", but this is as dumb as measuring importance of online articles by how many times people click on them: you optimize for books that look more approachable rather than ones which are more valuable. I would rather see the entire rest of that shelf deleted than that book :/. I left a response inside the book on the slip, which was a way for faculty (which I sort of am) to defend why books shouldn't be removed, but it did not make me leave the library suddenly excited to return.

I used the UCSC Science Library daily when I was an undergraduate. I found the library close to useless: lots of open space with little seating. Beyond the frequently-used reference books (Bielstein, my old friend) and weekly journals, I rarely accessed the historical books.

What really stunk about the library is that is was impossible to study. A classic east-coast library has basements and subbasements with lots of study spots and it's quiet like a tomb. The Science Library at UCSC was never quiet and it had very few seats, so you'd have a hard time finding a place to study.

I'm not opposed to removing the weekly journals- they are almost entirely read online. Even the historical journals are/should be scanned for online access.

I don't know what the arrangements are for access for the books moved off site, but in my experience, when done right it is very convenient for researchers. My former university moved all the older science books and journals off publicly accessible shelves. Now you put in an online request for the article or chapter you want and within 24 hours you get a scanned pdf. Since this is exactly what I would be doing myself anyway, the system made it much more convenient to access chapters of books that are not available digitally online.

As a researcher, I care about the information, not the library building. Not having to go to the library is a convenience.

> My friend Gildas, a biblical scholar, went to the Science library last week to consult an important book on ancient technologies. He had consulted the book several times before. Oops! De-duplicated.

I don't understand...de-duplicated means it is accessible in some other way, like another shelf in the library, or electronically.

Is the de-duplication not de-duplication? Or does the author think duplication is better?

"The library “lost” the list of the books which it de-duplicated, so we don’t know which among them were rare or important."

What purposes does the university serve?

another example of corporate ideology and management-theory snake oil wreaking havoc on a research institution.