Re: Sobral and Langer 2008 (was pteros have lift-off)

[Tim Williams <tijawi@yahoo.com>]

I understand your point, Augusto.  And I don't disagree with you.  However, my 
post was concerning research that you might want to be *taken seriously*.  In 
short, do you want to "piss with the big boys"?  :-)  


Of course, you may publish anywhere you like.  By all means, submit an article 
to "Prehistoric Times", or even to "Playboy" (which, as we all know, people 
only buy for the articles).  Or submit to an internet blogspot.  But you have 
to be prepared for the prospect of your work being ignored by the scientific 
community.  It all depends on what your target audience is, and whether you 
want your ideas to have 'equal time' to those published in scientific journals. 
 


I'm not demeaning the blogosphere, BTW.  There are some excellent blogs out 
there.  Take Darren Naish's blog, for example 
(http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/).  But Darren's best science surfaces 
in his published papers, with his blog often devoted to more (*ahem*) 
off-the-wall topics.


Not all peer-reviewed scientific papers are good.  Many are crap.  But at least 
there is some kind of standard applied during the peer review process (even if 
it's not as even-handed and objective as it could be).  Sometimes there are 
good reasons why papers are rejected.


Cheers

Tim


--- On Fri, 1/23/09, Augusto Haro <augustoharo@gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Augusto Haro <augustoharo@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: Sobral and Langer 2008 (was pteros have lift-off)
> To: tijawi@yahoo.com
> Date: Friday, January 23, 2009, 10:13 PM
> I think it is the best thing to try to publish via
> peer-reviewed
> science. You go with the rules, get your paper improved by
> help of
> peers and helps your curriculum if you are a researcher.
> 
> But if you are tired of sending something that always get
> rejected,
> and you think nobody is understanding what you say, or will
> let it
> pass to publication, and think the corrections you receive
> are not
> right, I think you do not have other way if trying to
> difund your
> ideas. Note that I am not saying that "orthodoxy"
> is wrong of that the
> man oppossing the mainstream is a "genius".
> Whoever is right, I say
> this is what I would do if I have a manuscript about
> something I think
> I'm right, and gets rejected a great number of times.
> 
> Just that looking an alternative way of difussion is the
> only way you
> have if you think you cannot get an understanding with
> other
> scientists. What anybody else does or does not with that
> publication
> is other thing, and is left to anyone's free will.