This proposal is dead on arrival.
Experts have no monopoly on truth or accuracy, and anyone who thinks
otherwise should heed the words of Harry Hess -- the guy who came up
with the sea-floor spreading hypothesis -- when he accepted the
Geological Society of America's Penrose Medal for advancing the study of
the geosciences:
"As a geologist who has often guessed wrong, I deeply appreciate the
generosity of the Society in balancing my errors against deductions of
mine not yet proven incorrect. I am pleased to come out with a positive
balance."
And what is wrong with the elitist attitude in suggestion No. 2, in
which only those who publish in venues monitored by the ISI should be
allowed to post? Let me count the ways...
Dave
On 5/28/2013 1:05 AM, Thomas J. Givnish wrote:
Gentlepeople –
I would like to offer two suggestions.
First, we each restrict our commentary to topics about which we, as
individuals, are experts.
Second, each individual should restrict the number of commentaries offered
per month to the number of times that individual's publications were cited
during all of last year, according to ISI.
Generally, ECOLOG-L is consulted by grad students and post-docs looking for
jobs and informed advice about field techniques, analytical approaches, and job
hunting. ECOLOG-L serves those purposes well. But when a few individuals
repeatedly offer their opinions – which are frequently ill-informed – it clogs
up thousands of email boxes across the country, spreads misinformation, and
raises the hackles of people who know better and feel compelled to rebut the
errors. My two proposals, if self-policed, would eliminate all these problems
and insure that a larger share of the opinion traffic is solidly based.
Everyone is entitled to free speech, but if in a given month your opinion
comments exceed ALL of your field-wide citations from last year, perhaps it's
time to think about whether large numbers of folks want to hear what you have
to say, when you want to say it, as frequently as you would like to say it.
Cheers, Tom
Thomas J. Givnish
Henry Allan Gleason Professor of Botany
University of Wisconsin
[email protected]
http://botany.wisc.edu/givnish/Givnish/Welcome.html
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6467 Hanna Drive | Cell: (804) 305-5234
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"We have met the enemy and he is us." -- Pogo
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