Articles by Christian Schwabe

In response to your article on academic job security and tenure [R. Finn, The Scientist, Nov. 11, 1996, page 1], I feel compelled to point out that it is indeed the academic institution per se that is threatened. The anti-tenure sentiment often displayed as a necessity, based on financial consideration, is merely a change in the sentiment of a new breed of flashy, superficially educated and insignificant administrators who must control and who are now conveniently giving in to public sentiment

T.V. Rajan's article "Cause Of Current Funding Crisis May Lie In De-emphasis Of Scholarship" [The Scientist, April 29, 1996, page 10] was informative and thought-provoking, but it had little to do with its title. Scholarship is as hard to sell as it is to define, and the personal inclinations or prerequisites for scholarship cannot be taught directly. Is it possible or desirable to educate just prospective Newtons and Einsteins? Of course, that is facetious, and there is a lot of room between N

The recent flurry of stories concerning information suppression and punitive actions against scientists who do not conform (P. Rushton, The Scientist, Oct. 3, 1994, page 13; P. Duesberg, The Scientist, March 20, 1995, page 12) is quite disconcerting. To those who contrive to withhold from nonconformists grants or access to public debate, one should say: Please be kind to our dissidents. Anything worth doing has been started by them, and any mainstream that today dominates segments of science wa

I am writing in reference to a citation champion entitled "Why do female adders copulate so frequently?" (T. Madsen, R. Shine, J. Loman, T. Hakansson, Nature, 355:440-1, 1992), as reported in The Scientist (Hot Papers, March 8, 1993, page 15). Difficult as it is to get scientifically sound but new ideas into print, one's professional sensitivities are perturbed to read about such a preposterous idea printed in Nature and heavily cited by other scientists within one year. Polygamy among cert

Please forgive my urge to share a few thoughts concerning the Stewart-Feder execution by the establishment. In my view, scientists are divided into two groups, one of which, perhaps best represented by John Edsall, practices science for its own sake and another group that is represented by those who cheer the ignominious action taken against Stewart and Feder. One group has nothing to fear from monitors of misconduct; the other group stands to lose prominence, careers, committee membership,

In your article concerning the investigation of Robert Gallo (The Scientist, April 13, 1992, page 3), Edward Ahrens recalls the statement of a faculty member (and appears to endorse it) who said, "After all, we have got to remember among ourselves that science is a profession where you have to put up with making mistakes all the time." Neither the case of David Baltimore nor the Gallo case is based on the kind of error one makes in the laboratory. The Baltimore case involved allegations of ou

It was refreshing to read the comments of David Horrobin in "Discouraging Hypotheses Slows Progress." I have thought about this problem many times and feel that a journal--perhaps called Idea--might help. An article considered for publication would not be peer reviewed and would have to meet only the following criteria: Is it written in readable English? Is it free of nonscience motives? Is it free of perpetual motion machines? Is it new? Everything should be left to the reader. Most peculiarl

One of your special features in The Scientist of July25 entitled “Good Scientists, Bad Science?” (page 1) has touched me such that I must respond. Granted there are scientists who give dissent a bad name, but that category would in my opinion include only those who falsify data in order to push an opposing hypothesis. These people should be made to feel the discontent of the scientific society to the fullest, but both cases cited in your articles seem not to fall into that cate