Re: Stegosaurus preparation photos take two...

[frank bliss <frank@blissnet.com>]

This is  an amazing group to say the least, what a brain trust!

Tom,

I stand chastised on who was making the "noise".  It was not meant 
personally to anyone in particular just a flawed, not well thought 
through observation (I believe I said perception).  I didn't mean to 
suggest that paleontologist are created out of nothing but it takes an 
initiating spark (like life was created out of the soup) and one is 
born.  I bet you always knew you were a paleontologist growing up only 
to discover when you actually became one, you weren't all along.  Ahh, 
the delusions of youth. I believe my point was that paleontologists 
evolve and suddenly become real paleontologists upon the completion of 
a series of hurdles that have yet to become entirely clear to me.  
Gradualists need not apply.  One day your not, and the next you are. 
Thus the punctuation analogy.

Apparently there is a broadly based opinion on the list that you have 
to be professional ie. published/degreed/underpaid and peer reviewed to 
be a paleontologist. I hereby agree that to be an "official" 
accomplished paleontologist you have to fulfill all these obligations. 
But I include a few more personal observations about obvious 
contradictions in the logic.

Though I am retired and ranching, I write a weekly local newspaper 
column about geology, all the locals consider me a geologist. I must 
admit I have occasionally have been introduced to groups of kids as a 
paleontologist, usually by the teacher and not by me.  This will stop 
immediately.

As a result, I also suppose that paleontology, used as an adjective, 
will become more necessary when being introduced as a speaker (for 
example) to a mixed class from kindergarten to 6th grade from a local 
school.  Since my highly detailed masters thesis was concerning 
biostratigraphic issues, I should be introduced to the kids as Mr. 
Bliss, Biostratigrapher just so I can watch the kids eyes spin in their 
orbits.  It was much easier to steal (apparently) the title of 
paleontologist to explain an affiliation of interest and activity than 
to go into the fact that I am a 30 year experienced 
collector/preparator of old dead things, with hundreds of fossils in 
repository, who happens to have an advanced degree in a geological 
field with a pseudo-working knowledge of a few paleontological issues.  
I now will have to introduce myself as a paleontologically oriented 
biostratigrapher who happens to collect dinosaur bones on my ranch 
toward the furtherance of the science.  I have a suspicion that I just 
lost all the K-third grade kids, most of the rest of them, and probably 
the teachers.  It is hard to get kids back into your talk if you loose 
them on the first thing you say.  This may be new to those of you that 
teach undergraduates/post graduates since they are lost before the 
discussion starts most of the time because of the hang over from the 
night before.  I guess that all the glory and big money that I get from 
grade school talks, opening up with any kind of paleontological title 
will have to go by the wayside. I don't consider myself a 
paleontologist anyway so c'est la vie.  I suspect it was just a 
linguistic conveyance to communicate the issue to young minds.  I bet I 
am the only guy on the list though with 4 big tattoos of fossils on 
board.  (I think this ought to be a prerequisite for the title because 
if you think you have suffered for the science, get a big trilobite 
tattooed on your shoulder and reconsider the point!) I always have my 
illustrations with me. ;-)

I always thought when you got paid regularly to do something that you 
were considered professional at it.  (just ask the IRS, professional 
photographers and musicians) But that is flawed thinking here because 
professional collectors get paid for what they do and the SVP will have 
nothing to do with them let alone let any of them be called 
paleontologists (except for a few special cases perhaps?) Do you have 
to make a living as a paleontologist to be one?  I am not sure if any 
paleontologists actually make a living as they should.  But wait, the 
bigger money is with those that get big publicity. If I were being paid 
as a paleontologist, I would consider my self one BTW.

I do believe however, such issues are indeed fairly specific to this 
science because I have never heard of this before this week and I 
consider myself a pretty good observer of science. Maybe I should just 
stick with Geologist as my personal title, but wait, I have worked 
professionally as a geologic consultant, given advice to county and 
state governments, been a spokesman for and secretary of the board for 
a professional group of 30 plus geologists (the Geologists of Jackson 
Hole), but I haven't published any of it in the journals.  I guess I am 
not a geologist either.  I am trying to figure out why I spent 6 years 
in college, and got that masters degree. This becomes very messy 
doesn't it.  I guess I am just a collector now.  But wait, I have never 
been paid as a collector.  Arrrrgh.  That leaves rancher.  Whoops 
....... I forgot that ranchers never make money and they sure as heck 
don't publish very much. So much for professional ranchers. At least I 
am an EMT, no wait, I am a volunteer............................

Obviously there are many levels of achievement in any profession.  A 
police officer that is a beginning road officer is still a cop as is 
the desk captain who has obtained a much higher level of achievement 
and training.  The main confusion is not within this list anymore, but 
with the public and the public response to the publicity.  I am not 
sure that some people who call themselves paleontologist (I mean the 
ones that apparently by quorum, don't deserve it.) mean it like someone 
claiming to be a medical doctor when they are not.  As I explained 
above, it is a matter of expediency of communication that makes up for 
the difficulty in communicating ones general interest.  I have no doubt 
that some abuse the title occurs.

Does the public as a whole actually grasp this publicity issue?  Of 
course not, my point is that it is granted that highly educated and 
accomplished paleontological types have the right and should be able to 
call them selves what ever they want.  Do they have an official lock on 
the title? Not yet. The SVP should press to get a law passed to 
governmentally license the occupation in order to prevent somebody from 
gaining from improperly using the title. (Oh boy, more government 
control!)  There are licensed professional geologists now to go along 
with licensed medical doctors,  psychs, etc, etc.  There would be 
perks.  A licensed paleontologist should be able to go on any 
government land and dig up what ever they please without having to go 
through the paperwork SNAFU. Fines should be slapped on transgressors 
of the title and the money used to further the science.  Anybody caught 
with a fossil without a license would be in big trouble.  Kind of like 
a concealed weapons permit for paleontologists. Keep the title out of 
the hands of children though and the safety on.

Sorry about the sarcasm, I hope I clarified my confusion.

I like the cladogram idea and it would be an interesting and probably 
publishable project. Sounds like a good use for an idle grad student.

Frank Bliss
MS Biostratigraphy
Weston, Wyoming
On Apr 27, 2005, at 6:33 AM, Thomas R. Holtz, Jr. wrote:

> > From: owner-dinosaur@usc.edu [mailto:owner-dinosaur@usc.edu]On Behalf 
> > Of
> > frank bliss
> >
> > I perceived it was the
> > "paleontologists" who were making a significant amount of the noise in
> > this discussion about the level of achievement necessary to be titled
> > as such.
>
> Which is rather unusual, given the following observations based on the 
> Dinolist Archives:
>
> Using this post (http://dml.cmnh.org/2005Apr/msg00366.html) as the 
> starting point, the relevant posters have been:
> Varner (paleoartist)	7 posts
> Schmidt (fossil dealer)	3 posts
> Hartman (graduate student in vertebrate paleontology)	2 posts (1 sent 
> multiple times)
> Ohmes (?)	2 posts
> Simon (?)	2 posts
> Holtz (professional paleontologist)	1 post (okay, now 2 posts)
> Cliff Green (artist)	1 post
> Hirvela (?)	1 post
> Dykes (amateur paleo-bookkeeper)	1 post
> ReBecca Hunt (graduate student in vertebrate paleontology)	1 post
> Rey (paleoartist)	1 post
> Williams (professional paleontologist)	1 post
> Pharris (graduate student in linguistics)	1 post
> John Hunt (?)	1 post
>
> Tim Williams and I are the only two professional degreed paleos (as 
> far as I could see with my admittedly hurried glance) who have
> posted on these threads. And I made it very clear in my posting that 
> plenty of actual paleontologists (i.e., people who do
> paleontology, which is a science) do not actually have degrees. So 
> long as they are doing science, they are scientists, degree or
> not.
>
> And yet time and time again people who don't actually do science (see 
> earlier posting for definition) are introduced on talk shows
> and such as "paleontologists". Well, no, they aren't. Sorry if that 
> makes some people feel bad, but I'm not in the "make people feel
> good business"; I'm a scientist.
>
> Science cannot get done without a lot of help. We need administrators 
> to run institutions and help find funding; preparators to
> clean the specimens (although they may also be researchers in their 
> own right: see below); artists to illustrate them; editors and
> publishers to run the journals; and most importantly of all, field 
> workers to help collect the specimens. (And, at some places,
> graduate students to do all the work...) But the administrators, 
> editors, and publishers don't claim to be paleontologists, and
> those preparators who aren't interested in research are happy to call 
> themselves preparators. Graduate students rightly and fairly
> call themselves paleontologists in training, as already stated on this 
> list and in stark contrast to Frank's assertion that the
> professionals somehow believe that paleos are born fully formed ex 
> nihilo.
>
> Sometimes, I gotta wonder: do nuclear physicists and geochemists and 
> microbiologists have this same issue...?
>
> Incidentally, what does Horner have to say about the issue of 
> preparators-as-scientists? Let's see... oh, here it is! _Digging
> Dinosaurs_, p. 22 [talking about his days at Princeton]:
> 	"A preparator's lot can vary greatly depending on his boss. He may be 
> only a backroom technician, a hired hand with no say in the
> research. Or he may work as a junior partner in the research, 
> collaborating with his boss rather than just scubbing clean the
> summer's haul of femurs and tibias. My situation was probably the best 
> a preparator could hope for. My boss, Don Baird, and I worked
> together on several research projects."
>
>                 Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
>                 Vertebrate Paleontologist
> Department of Geology           Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
> University of Maryland          College Park Scholars
>         Mailing Address:
>                 Building 237, Room 1117
>                 College Park, MD  20742
>
> http://www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/
> http://www.geol.umd.edu/~jmerck/eltsite
> Phone:  301-405-4084    Email:  tholtz@geol.umd.edu
> Fax (Geol):  301-314-9661       Fax (CPS-ELT): 301-405-0796