After Richard Yarnell wrote: "The main difference [between popular and scientific writing] is "scientific method" and peer review. If we distinguish between hearsay and rigorous scientific reporting, a good deal of what is being discovered and published now should stand the test of time." Ron Law later posted the following message: >The following editorial in the British Medical Journal might be of >interest to some in light of recent discussion about the objectivity of >science. > >BMJ 1997;315:759-760 (27 September) > >Editorials: Peer review: reform or revolution? > >Time to open up the black box of peer review *********** Etc. (the entire editorial) ************* From firsthand experience my colleagues and I have learned the hard way that the anonymous review process largely accomplishes the following three end results: 1) Manuscripts that support prevailing viewpoint gain favorable reviews. 2) Grant proposals that would appear to yield supportive evidence for existing theory gain favorable reviews. 3) The anonymous review system can thus actually slow scientific progress. Patrick H. Wells and I provided documentation for one such episode in our own experience in Excursus EXC of our book: 1990 Wenner, A.M. and P.H. Wells. ANATOMY OF A CONTROVERSY: The Question of a "Language" Among Bees. Columbia University Press. (Ironically, that book received severe anonymous peer review at two levels before it was accepted for publication, a fact that has not deterred language proponents from ignoring its content.) Adrian Adrian M. Wenner (805) 963-8508 (home phone) 967 Garcia Road (805) 893-8062 (UCSB FAX) Santa Barbara, CA 93106 ******************************************************************************* * * "...it is lamentable how each man draws his own different conclusions * from the very same fact" * * Charles Darwin, in a letter to Alfred Russel Wallace on 1 May 1857 * *******************************************************************************