Re: Second Thoughts on Sue

[Stephen Faust <smfaust@edisto.cofc.edu>]

Sue has the commercial interests interested. This may not be a one time 
isolated event. Now is the time to suggest how subsequent projects can 
continue to assist them in making money.You think Sue cost a lot? Not 
really where corporations come from.Execs are paid millions a year and 
the houses and cars of even junior execs could fund lots of vp work.Think 
what the price of a Ferrari could do, or, maybe, just a BMW for a 
summer's project.If these guys can make money with it, they will fund it. 
It's your business to show them how...or continue to complain about your 
lot with your professional noses in the air.

Stephen Faust                   smfaust@edisto.cofc.edu

On Mon, 6 Oct 1997 Gothgrrl@aol.com wrote:

> Pieter Depuydt wrote:
> 
> >If you had a budget of  >8million$ and were asked to 
> >choose: 'rescue' Sue or create a lot of reasonably paid >paleontology
> fellowship/postdoc/research positions, from >which choice paleontology as a
> science would benefit >most.....? Isn't there quite a discepancy between the
> >commercial value of some spectacular fossils and the >professional future
> prospects of the people who dedicate >their life studying them?
> 
> There's a good point here, that I've been bringing up since the announcement
> was made that Sotheby's would auction "Sue." That the specimen is invaluable
> to the study of theropod dinosaurs is undeniable, and I *am* very happy to
> see it going to the FMNH. But, at the same time, it is rather insane, isn't
> it? I mean, just *imagine* the jobs that could have been created, the
> research that could have been conducted, the *other* invaluable specimens
> that could have been collected, the publications and expeditions that might
> have been funded, with that 8 million. For vp, that a bloody fortune. And
> it's all going to one single specimen. 
> 
> But I suspect there's no turning back. Not without powerful legislation that
> can be enforced. Vertebrate palaeontologists will now (and, in truth, we have
> been for some time) in competition with commercial collectors and private
> bidders, as long as we are willing to play the game. It's a hard decision,
> whether to let a marvel like "Sue" slip away, possibly forever, or aid in
> commercialising our science by attempting to save the specimen.
> 
> Caitlin R. Kiernan
>