- Joined
- Dec 22, 2004
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- 1,713
Fujisawas Sake said:Dr. Matveev,
I think I would have to respectfully disagree. Yes, I have seen sloppy peer review and the occasional bad paper that slips through the cracks, but this can be also attributed to academic laziness. I see no evidence that reviewers lack brains, just sometimes they lack the drive to really examine papers.
What is your definition of science? How do you personally view the philosophy, history, and methods of science? Its been my observation that specialization seems to be the progression of the sciences, as we find that the answers to our questions about the world around us lead to more questions. There is a saying here: "the Doctorate knows a whole lot about little bit". I understand; an erosion of general science knowledge comes when you sacrifice a lot of your time specializing to earn that advanced degree.
It seems to me that you are saying that no one tries to come up with new scientific theories or that we take the old theories as gospel. I agree that's not good science. However I see no proof that this is universally the current mindset. I see challenges to established theories in the life sciences often, even if on a larger scale (morphological, anatomical, etc.).
Do you think that more emphasis on science history would help this situation? How would you go about protecting general knowledge?
It may be that specialization is damaging general theoretical knowledge. It could also be that such specialists are guilty of knowledge-hoarding, and refusal to share their discoveries. Academic theft is rampant, as well as the evil of plaigarism. Could it not be that we can have specialization while encouraging the free exchange of ideas? Sure, not everyone will want to do this (I know too well the scourge of academic elitism), but such an exchange might shift the mindset of the life sciences to a cooperative, and allow for a "six degrees of seperation" between old and new theories.
Once again, thanks for your post.
Oh, and Matt? Sadly, those resources are VERY finite...
John
I'm with John on this. The peer review process certainly isn't perfect, but I think its a basic necessity of having an organized scientific system. I've heard that Leigh Van Valen's "Red Queen" paper--comparing extinction rate to taxonomic longevity--had to be submitted a half dozen times before being published. On the other hand, without the peer review system, the scientific culture that allowed the idea to form may not even exist.
As for "overspecialization," I think it is something that we certainly all have observed, but I don't think it is as rampant as often thought. One way this is fought is to have really nasty prelims and qualifying exams for PhD students. Someone I know here at Madison who did his prelims a couple years ago is a good example: he's a sedimentologist, but he had to write for an hour about Sepkoski's three faunas.
Dan