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Scientific American In Blog Removal Controversy
Lasrick writes "Danielle N. Lee, Ph.D, the Urban Scientist blogger at Scientific American, has been mistreated twice: once by the blog editor at biology-online.org and now by SciAm itself. The blog editor asked Dr. Lee to contribute a blog post at Biology-Online, and when she declined (presumably for lack of monetary compensation), the blog editor asked her whether she was 'an urban scientist or an urban whore.' Then, SciAm deleted her blog post, in which she wrote about the incident."
So real science is just like we see it on TV? Nice to know.
Time Bomber the Book coming soon.
Why wouldn't it count as evidence? Perhaps the word you were looking for (two actually) is incontrovertible proof?
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
So let's extend the analogy, since it was used first by the Biology-Online.org representative it's fair game right?
Headline should have been:
Biology-Online.org representative admits it is always looking to screw it's contributors!
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
She was right to want to say something and discuss the issue, but stuff like that belongs somewhere that clearly labels it an op-ed piece. It was not an article about science.
SciAm was wrong for removing it without notifying her of why. Perhaps they should have just moved it to an op-ed section for her. Or maybe it's against their policy to comment about competing websites, though that'd be weird. They tweeted this:
Re blog inquiry: @sciam is a publication for discovering science. The post was not appropriate for this area & was therefore removed.
Everyone has moments, hopefully not many, where they are slighted professionally. Having an audience placed in front of you does not mean you get to neglect them and use it as a soapbox for your issues.
is an urban scientist?
Scientific publishing operates more on trust than most people realize, and more than the legal system does. If I say I got this band on a western blot, and submit it to Science (the journal), they run routine checks to make sure I haven't done any very dumb editing like in MS paint. They send it to reviewers who will flag it if there's anything glaringly obvious technically. If the claims are extraordinary, they'll require more proof. But at the end of the day, I'm sending them things which could fairly easily be faked.
Why is it this way? Two reasons, one it's impossible to be absolutely sure of anything (as zero kelvin pointed out) and two, because scientists are generally not in it to lie to other people.
So unless there's a good motive for the person to lie, like an undisclosed financial incentive, why don't we assume scientists are being honest? Especially given that no one is disputing it and SciAm gave a politician's apology (or apologized without apologizing).
I think this is a little more outrageous than a joke about big dongles, don't you think? ;)
There's no reason to cover for an abusive person.
It's not a good bet that it was private in any sense. If that's what they said to her directly, what were they saying behind her back?
Nearly everything presented as "evidence" in court is easily faked. Witnesses are bought, knives look like murder weapons, unless everyone on the jury is a medical examiner and can see the wounds don't match the knife type. Evidence is evidence, even if not "strong" or "incontrovertible".
Learn to love Alaska
Which is why you're both posting anonymously on slashdot.
I find the SciAm editor's explanation lame and unsatisfactory.
Her tweet expressed this: "At Scientific American, we don't allow our bloggers to air personal grievances."
Her subsequent explanation expressed this: "As a women scientist, I am personally concerned with the type of issues that Dr. Lee raised; however, we simply did not have time to investigate them when she posted her allegations."
Note that the two are completely different (and I will give her credit for this point, that she was aware there was a big difference).
Now, assuming her second explanation was accurate, what did the editor do when she found out about the allegations? One would think that she would have immediately recognized this as serious situation, the type of thing that she was hired to handle. She should then immediately
1) Email Dr. Lee and attempt to reach her by phone, and ask her to confirm/provide details about the allegations made in the blog post
2) Email the Biology-online editor and attempt to reach him by phone, and ask whether he in fact sent the email in question
Had the answer to point #2 been "yes", then Dr. Lee's blog post should have remained intact, and the next issue would be, what to do about SciAm's now troubled relationship with Biology-online.
Apparently the editor-in-chief did none of those things. After all, it was "Friday before a long weekend." Everyone has things to do... places to go... people to meet.
If I were Scientific American, the last thing in the world I'd want to be associated with is this "ofek@biology-online.org" loser. Seriously, unless you're in law enforcement or the sex trade, you probably shouldn't be calling anyone a whore in your professional capacity.
But her response was combative, contained profanity, and implied (if unlikely) threats of violence. If I were a stodgy magazine like SciAm, I wouldn't want to be associated with that either.