John Whitehead complains about the difficulty of finding peer reviewers for a paper.
This is not an atypical paper. I try potential referees who are experts
in the area (searching for keywords in Google Scholar and Scopus),
authors of papers in the reference section, referees suggested by the
authors, referees suggested by the Elsevier Electronic System,
colleagues, friends and neighbors. Potential referees are often too busy
(with a stack of other reviews), not in the correct field to review the
paper, or much, much worse, ignore the request ("un-invited before
agreeing to review"). I understand all this but when I go oh for ten I
begin to wonder what the point of it is.
Later on he notes:
I don't have this problem for MRE where I typically ask two people to referee and they are both happy to do it.
The first journal (unnamed) is published by Elsevier. MRE is published by Marine Resource Economics and Allen Press. A coincidence? Youdecide.
A judge threw out the suit. But that's not the end of it.
In January, the American Tradition Institute Environmental Law Center filed a Freedom of Information Act request "documents, including e-mails Mann exchanged with other scientists while employed at the university". Since the University of Virginia is a public institution, it must comply with the request, and it will provide the material by mid-August.
Going after Mr. Mann only discourages the sort of scientific inquiry
that, over time, sorts out fact from speculation, good science from bad.
Academics must feel comfortable sharing research, disagreeing with
colleagues and proposing conclusions -- not all of which will be correct --
without fear that those who dislike their findings will conduct
invasive fishing expeditions in search of a pretext to discredit them.
That give-and-take should be unhindered by how popular a professor's
ideas are or whose ideological convictions might be hurt.
Scientific progress depends on transparency, the Board said, but "the
sharing of research data is vastly different from unreasonable,
excessive Freedom of Information Act requests for personal information
and voluminous data that are then used to harass and intimidate
scientists."
Let me repeat that last phrase. It captures my feelings precisely:
The
sharing of research data is vastly different from unreasonable,
excessive Freedom of Information Act requests for personal information
and voluminous data that are then used to harass and intimidate
scientists.
At least it's not confidential if you work at a public institution in a state, like Wisconsin, with strong freedom of information laws.
As Wisconsin's capital continued to echo with debate over the controversial legislation that strips public unions of collective bargaining rights, a history professor at the University of Wisconsin in Madison publicly joined the conversation last week with his first post on a new blog.
It was a lengthy and speculative examination of a national organization for conservative lawmakers that the professor, William Cronon, believed was partly responsible for what he described as "this explosion of radical conservative legislation." The post soon received more than a half million hits, he said.
Two days later, on March 17, while attending a conference of historians, Professor Cronon learned that a public records request had been filed by a state Republican Party official demanding access to months of messages on his university e-mail account that referred to certain politicized words and names, including the governor and a number of legislators. ("Wisconsin Professor's E-Mails Are Target of G.O.P. Records Request", by A. G. Sulzberger, The New York Times, 26 March 2011)
I am not a lawyer, so I don't know how Connecticut's laws compare to Wisconsin's, but this is what the Office of Audit, Compliance, & Ethics has to say on its information page:
The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public university. UConn is
also considered a State Agency under the executive branch of the State
of Connecticut. As a public university and State Agency, UConn is
subject to the requirements of the Connecticut Freedom of Information
Act. This means that any record created or maintained by UConn faculty
or staff is presumed to be available to the public, except under very
limited circumstances.
I think it's safe to conclude that if anyone filed a Freedom of Information Act request asking to see e-mails I'd written, there's a very good chance that the University would have to comply -- unless the request were demonstrably a "fishing expedition" with no particular target or purpose.
In April Michael Cuccineli, the attorney general of Virginia, filed suit ordering the University of Virginia to hand over documents and other materials relating to Michael Mann's research when he was a faculty member there. The AAAS asked Cucinelli either to justify his actions or withdraw the suit, and the University opted to fight the request in court. Even a vigorous critic of Mann called Cuccinelli's suit a "witch hunt." Here's how Molly Corbett Broad, President of the American Council on Education, describes the situation:
A fundamental principle is at stake, often described in shorthand as academic freedom. More to the point, it's the understanding that government will not without extraordinarily compelling reasons intrude on the process of scientific discovery. It's a principle on which liberals and conservatives alike can agree.
The ill-advised investigation in Charlottesville transgresses a long-honored boundary, with implications that extend far beyond the Albemarle County courthouse where the university has filed a petition to block the subpoena. That is why I, along with other higher education leaders, scientists and scholars (including even some of Professor Mann's scientific detractors), support the university's legal battle.
Follow that link to read the whole thing. It's worth your time.
