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Much of recent research on small mammal population ecology is based on the dichotomy between "cyclic" and "non-cyclic" populations. One of the main methods to distinguish the two types of fluctuations, the s-index, is shown to have several technical weaknesses. We further demonstrate that the dichotomy is an artificial one, and argue that the adherence to the uniqueness of "cyclic" populations has had a strong hampering effect on the development of small mammal population research.