I'm not a scientist, but after seeing some debates here (eg the AAT one
can get pretty rank, eh?), I had a thought. I'm probably not the first one
who's had this idea. Certainly not the last.

FAQs save energy in the long run... but how easy it would be for one to
present one's theory in web document, references included (as links)! It'd
be even nicer if/when a news reader could provide users with a quick link
to a www page or reference insered by the writer. (In fact, I already jump
quickly from news or email to a web page just by selecting the web
reference and pasting it into my web browser... takes about 10 seconds for
me to get from here to there, and then I can come right back to where I
was when finished.)

If/when someone made their own unsupported theory, it would be easy for
most readers to conclude inadequate referencing. It would also be easy to
link your own pertinent, scientific critism DIRECTLY to the enemies'
page(s), or bogus reference, as long as the source document(s) were
static.

Web pages could be linked across the scientific community, and in several
places in the same document. Each scientist's theory would not only be
published, but maintained dynamically (kept up to date) or stabilized as
required.

Part of the scientific community must already be publishing hypotheses,
theories, and research this way somewhere, because it's so easy to do?
Does anyone know of any papers published this way?

_______________________________________________
It's all just a grand {*filter*}... pass it on!

--
_______________________________________________
It's all just a grand {*filter*}... pass it on!

[Stuff deleted]

[more stuff deleted]

I am inclined to agree with you, Kenneth, that USENET is not the place for
scholarly dissertation, try as certain groups might to make it such.  The very
open nature of USENET invites free conversation.  It is a place for testing
the waters, for asking questions, for meeting new people.  For publishing,
however, it is unsuitable for most people.

I publish a horror magazine as a Web Page.  True, this is not anthropology,
but I feel for the medium of short stories and the like, it is a better
vehicle than newsgroups. For one thing, you can structure discussion through a
letters to the editor page.  This lets you weed out the downright frivolous
and stupid.  For another, you can structure the document for "power browsing".
 Footnotes and the like can be added so that you can jump right to them.

The advantages of such publication are manifold.  When on the USENET, I let my
standards for discussion drop because that is the nature of the beast.  They
are higher when I participate on a mailing list and higher still when I edit
my magazine.

We can't do much to keep the sloppy traffic out of our groups short of
moderating them.  Some groups prefer to resort to flames as their means of
enforcing their alledged high standards, which is neither professional or
productive in the long wrong.  The best process for weeding out the wheat and
the chaff is one of submission and selection by an editor or editorial
committee.  The Web is a fine place for such activity.

Sincerely,

Joel GAzis-SAx

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What I can't understand is how scientists could earn tenure and/or research
grants this way.  After all, just posting something is not the same as having
it jury-reviewed for a proposal or a journal.  And it is not the same as
getting paid to write a book.  Unfortunately, I suspect the number of
independently wealthy scientists is not that large, and that most scientists
(like any other researchers) would feel that they would be best served by
saving their really important findings for juried submissions in which they
could win accolades and/or money.  And, let's face it--posting your findings
is far more likely to get you an email black eye than anything else.

The only way I see that working is by posting things that have already been
jury-reviewed and published, but then the organization with the copyright
would have a say in the matter.  It is hard enough to sell some of these
academic books:  I cannot really picture publishers agreeing to put the
contents online.

The people who would benefit the most, I would think, would be applied
scientists and other people whose jobs could benefit from constant exposure to
new scientific discoveries:  i.e, the people most interested in READING the
stuff, rather than publishing their own (because they are earning their
livelihood another way).

In addition, not very many people have as easy access as you do to web pages,
and it is not that obvious that it will be improving, since usage might be
rising as quickly as infrastructure is expanding.  I am at a large university,
and our web access is very slow (unless we turn "off" the graphics), and
invariably "crashes" if we access more than a few different sites at one
sitting.

I think what you are talking about is a lovely ideal, but it is hard for me to
picture it happening.  Even people who enjoy sharing their ideas and having
intellectual debates realize that they cannot "give away" the only thing that
is going to pay their bills--their very unique (and heretofore
unpublished) findings.  Perhaps if more publishers go online, it might happen,
but it is hard to imagine them all going online--infrastructure-wise,
financially,  and otherwise.