Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!uunet!bionet!agate!codon3.berkeley.edu!ladasky
From: ladasky@codon3.berkeley.edu (John Ladasky;1021 Solano No. 2;528-8666)
Newsgroups: bionet.general
Subject: Re: The Art of Starting Discussions
Message-ID: <24528@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 17 May 89 21:45:55 GMT
References: <8905161052.AA27822@net.bio.net> <12494445366.14.KRISTOFFERSON@BIONET-20.BIO.NET>
Sender: usenet@agate.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: ladasky@codon3.berkeley.edu.UUCP (John Ladasky)
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 39

In article <12494445366.14.KRISTOFFERSON@BIONET-20.BIO.NET> Kristofferson@BIONET-20.BIO.NET (David Kristofferson) writes:
>	Getting a discussion going on a scientific newsgroup in
>biology still seems to be something of a novel art form and I think
>that people are still groping here.  Nonetheless I am very encouraged
>by the spirit that is being shown in the POPULATION-BIOLOGY group
>which is the first one created on BIOSCI as a result of a vote of the
>community.

	I'm only a lowly undergraduate, so I'm sure that my head is still
cluttered with silly, idealistic visions of scientific researchers cooper-
ating as much as possible in order to make a better world 8^).  The problem 
with discussing research is not isolated to the biology newsgroups.  There
is secrecy to be found wherever there is credit to be taken.

>	The technique has worked in other fields.  For example, I
>*first* heard of the "cold fusion" controversy on sci.chem, a newly
>formed USENET group, before it hit the national press.  Later, news
>accounts related how the "modern miracle" of FAX machines was being
>used to pass preprints around the world.  My reaction to that was

	The results of the research were controversial, and the informa-
tion available to other researchers was apparently quite sparse.   The use
of newsgroups and FAX transmissions has actually been criticized for failing
to provide enough information to accurately reproduce the experiment in the
way that a journal article would allow.

	Hopefully, the presence of near-instantaneous communication facilities 
will not tempt us to jump the gun with our conclusions or omit details.  Of
course, newsgroups are a perfect forum for speculation.  There's no sense in
even starting a series of experiments that you could not justify to your scien-
tific peers.  The trick is to tell your colleagues enough about what you're 
doing to get their input, without giving away all your secrets...

>				kristofferson@bionet-20.bio.net

T CROSS POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS POLICE LINE DO NOT CR
_______________________________________________________________________________
"Do unto others as you would like		       - John J. Ladasky ("ii")
 to do unto them. " Richard Bach		  (ladasky@enzyme.berkeley.edu)