I only encountered once, but when it happened I had to realize how old science field may have been different.
The exact detail I was looking for should be in [20] … but “[20] to be published” (presumably by the same author). I couldn’t find any papers by author’s name other than that but the author was so sure getting published.
My favorite is recursive bad citations in the method section. As in, citing a paper that cited a previous paper that itself cited a previous paper that cited an abstract with no detailed methodology whatsoever, leaving the true methods a mystery unless you get the senior author to reply to emails.
I only encountered once, but when it happened I had to realize how old science field may have been different. The exact detail I was looking for should be in [20] … but “[20] to be published” (presumably by the same author). I couldn’t find any papers by author’s name other than that but the author was so sure getting published.
My favorite is recursive bad citations in the method section. As in, citing a paper that cited a previous paper that itself cited a previous paper that cited an abstract with no detailed methodology whatsoever, leaving the true methods a mystery unless you get the senior author to reply to emails.