By Bonnie Goldstein
Posted Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2008, at 2:09 PM ET Normally, peer review is a valuable step in the publication of scientific research. Scholars submit new discoveries to academic journals, which, in turn, solicit independent experts to assess the reliability of the work. Answers Research Journal, a new "professional, peer-reviewed technical" publication of "interdisciplinary scientific … research," has streamlined this process by inviting the submitting scholars to suggest who should review their work (Page 5). Here the goal is not to ensure that research meets academic standards of scientific inquiry, but rather to ensure that the scholar's conclusions conform to a literal interpretation of the Bible.
The journal is published by Answers in Genesis, "an apologetics (i.e., Christianity-defending) ministry" that also runs the Creation Museum. The editor-in-chief of Answers Research Journal, geologist and creationist Andrew Snelling, wants "to ensure that the Creation and Flood model is given the best possible development." To that end, he urges potential contributors to ask themselves whether their research "is formulated within a young-earth, young-universe framework," and to provide "evidence of faithfulness to the grammatical-historical/normative interpretation of Scripture." (See excerpts from the ARJ Instructions to Authors below and on Pages 2-5.) Snelling also demands rigorous adherence to style principles. (Page 4: "Use lowercase creation in most cases, except in a list of biblical events, especially 'Creation and Flood,' 'the Creation Week,' and 'Day One.' ")
As an extra incentive to participate, those with "a reason for not wanting their biographical details publicized on the AiG website" (such as seeking tenure at an institution with more rigorous notions about scholarship) may use a "pen name" (Page 2). In a recent ARJ microbe forum, two "independent scholars" (purportedly, Ph.D.s at "prominent research facilities in the eastern part of North America") submitted abstracts under the pseudonyms "Luke Kim" and "Ira Loucks" because they "prefer to keep their creationist credentials hidden for the moment until they achieve more seniority."
Thanks to Hot Document reader Jeremy Yoder for the tip.
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By Bonnie Goldstein
Posted Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2008, at 2:09 PM ET Bonnie Goldstein is a former special investigator to the U.S. Senate and investigative producer for ABC News.
Remarks from the Fray:
While I definitely have some issues with the material likely to be published in this particular journal I would like to make sure it doesn't get undeserved mockery.
Thus, I must reveal to all you in the public that MANY if not most scientific journals ask authors to recommend reviewers. Of course, they all reserve the right to choose which reviewers they will ultimately ask to do the review; but the journals that are least rigorous usually keep a panel of house reviewers to do all the reviews - better journals ask real experts, usually suggested by the authors themselves - and only the best, a relative few, can afford to do enough prior research to find the experts on their own and then convince those experts to do the reviews.
So actually, ARJ is following the accepted practice for mid-level peer reviewed journals, which would include any as specialized as it is.
The anonymous authorship is naturally a bit strange - most scientists are chomping at the bit to get papers they can claim. But one should really wonder whether 'publish or perish' yields the best results? Wouldn't the papers be more reliable if they were all anonymous and peer reviewed? Then you wouldn't have the pressure to publish the paper - you would only publish results you really believed in, one would expect - and peer review wouldn't necessarily be tainted by the publication of nonsense coming from an otherwise respectable lab. Not that this happens too often, frankly, but it can happen. You'd think that anonymity would lead to production of garbage, an a loss of responsibility and accountability, but many young researchers would rather have authorship on something marginal that they could later find out was flawed (and publish about again) than not have any papers at all.
--BenK
(To reply, click here.)
The creation of this journal fits into a larger context of cynical moves made by the creationist community to acquire the trappings of real science so as to be taken more seriously by an uninformed public. First they tried the direct approach: simply attempting to insert young-earth creationism into public school science curriculae. These attempts were repeatedly struck down by the courts, and they began to realize that in order to get into the science classroom, they would need to cloak their dogma in the language of "real science," which meant finding some like-minded people with Ph.D.'s (in any subject area), forming a research institute, and creating a peer-reviewed journal. In effect, this journal exists to provide bogus credentials to information that has failed consistently to be accepted by anyone in the mainstream scientific community so that it may ultimately be slipped into public science education.
--Fourmi
(To reply, click here.)
One of the curious aspects of this whole effort by the Flood theorists is that in essence these theists have conceded that Secularism and Scientific Objectivism has won the field of discourse. These folks recognize that as long as they invoke deity and primo genitor as the source of their conclusions, they will have little to no credibility in comparison to the conclusions drawn through secular objectivism (aka science).
So this journal takes on as many of the trappings of secular objectivism that it can muster without having to surrender its theological foundations. In essence it attempts to be a wolf in sheep's clothing.
These sort of parallel guises are very much akin to what we have seen with the advent of so called Intelligent Design "Theory". Like ID, this uses some of the trappings of science (aka secular objectivism) to create the illusion of proof that something exists beyond the secular. But trappings are not substance anymore than a hypothesis is equivalent to Scientific Theory
--degsme
(To reply, click here.)
(2/13)
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Remarks from the Fray:
While I definitely have some issues with the material likely to be published in this particular journal I would like to make sure it doesn't get undeserved mockery.
Thus, I must reveal to all you in the public that MANY if not most scientific journals ask authors to recommend reviewers. Of course, they all reserve the right to choose which reviewers they will ultimately ask to do the review; but the journals that are least rigorous usually keep a panel of house reviewers to do all the reviews - better journals ask real experts, usually suggested by the authors themselves - and only the best, a relative few, can afford to do enough prior research to find the experts on their own and then convince those experts to do the reviews.
So actually, ARJ is following the accepted practice for mid-level peer reviewed journals, which would include any as specialized as it is.
The anonymous authorship is naturally a bit strange - most scientists are chomping at the bit to get papers they can claim. But one should really wonder whether 'publish or perish' yields the best results? Wouldn't the papers be more reliable if they were all anonymous and peer reviewed? Then you wouldn't have the pressure to publish the paper - you would only publish results you really believed in, one would expect - and peer review wouldn't necessarily be tainted by the publication of nonsense coming from an otherwise respectable lab. Not that this happens too often, frankly, but it can happen. You'd think that anonymity would lead to production of garbage, an a loss of responsibility and accountability, but many young researchers would rather have authorship on something marginal that they could later find out was flawed (and publish about again) than not have any papers at all.
--BenK
(To reply, click here.)
The creation of this journal fits into a larger context of cynical moves made by the creationist community to acquire the trappings of real science so as to be taken more seriously by an uninformed public. First they tried the direct approach: simply attempting to insert young-earth creationism into public school science curriculae. These attempts were repeatedly struck down by the courts, and they began to realize that in order to get into the science classroom, they would need to cloak their dogma in the language of "real science," which meant finding some like-minded people with Ph.D.'s (in any subject area), forming a research institute, and creating a peer-reviewed journal. In effect, this journal exists to provide bogus credentials to information that has failed consistently to be accepted by anyone in the mainstream scientific community so that it may ultimately be slipped into public science education.
--Fourmi
(To reply, click here.)
One of the curious aspects of this whole effort by the Flood theorists is that in essence these theists have conceded that Secularism and Scientific Objectivism has won the field of discourse. These folks recognize that as long as they invoke deity and primo genitor as the source of their conclusions, they will have little to no credibility in comparison to the conclusions drawn through secular objectivism (aka science).
So this journal takes on as many of the trappings of secular objectivism that it can muster without having to surrender its theological foundations. In essence it attempts to be a wolf in sheep's clothing.
These sort of parallel guises are very much akin to what we have seen with the advent of so called Intelligent Design "Theory". Like ID, this uses some of the trappings of science (aka secular objectivism) to create the illusion of proof that something exists beyond the secular. But trappings are not substance anymore than a hypothesis is equivalent to Scientific Theory
--degsme
(To reply, click here.)
(2/13)