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From: zeus@zapodid.aero.org (Dave Suess)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.misc
Subject: Re: Strange results in Nature article (fallout...)
Summary: axe still not ground enough?
Keywords: skepticism debunking fear
Message-ID: <35118@aero.ARPA>
Date: 1 Aug 88 14:52:12 GMT
References: <1911@aecom.YU.EDU> <6445@megaron.arizona.edu> <492@metapsy.UUCP> <668@ns.UUCP> <495@metapsy.UUCP>
Sender: news@aero.ARPA
Reply-To: zeus@zapodid.UUCP (Dave Suess)
Organization: The Aerospace Corporation, El Segundo, CA
Lines: 33

In article <495@metapsy.UUCP> sarge@metapsy.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) writes:
>...  Debunkers, like bigots, ... play on our xenophobia ... in much the 
>same way as McCarthyites played on our fear of Communism. ... CSICOP
>was founded ... to engage in intellectual lynchings of people whose 
>views are disturbing to its members. ...
>A person with a new, revolutionary theory is in a very vulnerable position,
>even when not confronted by an organization whose intent appears to be
>to stamp out such theories.  Why make life even more difficult for
>such persons by hunting them down and pillorying them in public?

	I think it's because such persons insist on (or have the 
	unfortunate problem of) widespread press coverage.  It
	shakes the credibility of science in the eyes of the
	public when speculations that turn out to be mistakes are
	given such a hullaballoo, especially when the "new,
	revolutionary theory" involves areas whose proponents have
	included shysters, frauds, and unscientific mercenaries.

>It would be nice, though, if, in this modern age, scientists with new
>ideas or observations did not have to go through what Galileo et al
>had to go through in the old days.  The last thing we need is a New
>Inquisition.

	It's a truism to me that extraordinary claims require extra-
	ordinary proof.  It's also a truism to me that old arguments
	never go away: people on the fringes of science and hucksterism
	frequently plead "Galileo! Galileo!" when their world view
	is not adopted by the world.  Funny, this didn't happen to 
	Galileo in the scientific world ... nor did Newton and Einstein
	meet with persecution (reluctance, yes -- for their extra-
	ordinary claims required extraordinary proof, like Eddington's
	eclipse expedition).  How about updating the argument to use
	someone who's theory was wrongfully suppressed by the scientific
	community and later validated?  --  Dave Suess  zeus@aerospace.aero.org