Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site utastro.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!ut-sally!utastro!bill From: bill@utastro.UUCP (William H. Jefferys) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: Orphaned Response Message-ID: <488@utastro.UUCP> Date: Sun, 4-Aug-85 12:55:46 EDT Article-I.D.: utastro.488 Posted: Sun Aug 4 12:55:46 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 7-Aug-85 02:13:21 EDT References: <389@iham1.UUCP> <14600031@hpfcrs.UUCP> Organization: U. Texas, Astronomy, Austin, TX Lines: 58 > >Hmmm, these seem to be mostly(or exclusively) highly partisan > >creationist publications, I would like to see this stuff confirmed in > >proper refereed journals! I place about as much faith in these finds > >as I do in the Paluxy River "human footprints" - exactly none! > >(Actually, the first reference sounds like it is even worse than > >a creationist publication - a Von-Daenken-esque type pseudo-science > >book) > > > I am sometimes amazed at folks who claim to be scientific and open minded. I have to add to my previous remarks on this subject. For a number of very good reasons, scientists are unlikely to pay much attention to an article unless it has been at least submitted to a refereed journal. Articles in unrefereed journals, or even more, in the house organ of an outfit like the ICR, simply don't carry much weight. This may appear to be scientific snobbery, but it is not. Experience has shown that the best way to separate the wheat from the chaff, scientifically speaking, is to subject it to rigorous scrutiny by independent, anonymous referees prior to publication. I know from personal experience how greatly my own publications have been improved by this process. Therefore, scientific research gains its legitimacy by being published in a refereed journal. This does not mean that the research or its conclusions are correct - lots of stuff slips by that should not have been published, and lots of research is quickly outdated by new work (facts that Creationists seem to have a hard time learning!) Nor is it true that rejection of a work means that it is wrong. There are numerous examples of research that was rejected, but later on turned out to be correct. But submission of work to a refereed journal does mean that the author of thought highly enough of it to allow experts in the field to evaluate it critically. On the other hand, if one fails to submit ones research to such scrutiny, one as much as admits that it is not worthy of serious consideration. Creationists sometimes complain that their work would be automatically rejected, but the fact of the matter is that they have barely put that hypothesis to the test. A recent study showed that Creationists have submitted *hardly anything* for publication in refereed journals (except for submissions, not related to Creationism, in their own fields of expertise). The very few articles on Creationism that were submitted were in fact mostly rejected, not for their content, but because they did not even come up the the minimal standards of scholarship that any paper must pass. Several articles were still being reviewed. One editor volunteered that he would surely publish papers giving evidence for creationism if they were otherwise up to the standards of his journal, but that none had come across his desk. I am sure that this is true of most journals. So when Sarima complains that the referenced works appeared in unrefereed sources, he is not being closed minded. He is merely setting a very minimal standard. -- "Men never do evil so cheerfully and so completely as when they do so from religious conviction." -- Blaise Pascal Bill Jefferys 8-% Astronomy Dept, University of Texas, Austin TX 78712 (USnail) {allegra,ihnp4}!{ut-sally,noao}!utastro!bill (uucp) bill%utastro.UTEXAS@ut-sally.ARPA (ARPANET)