How do you discern sources?

[Ibrahim90]

Um, the paper referenced in the story is only 15 pages long. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jmor.10752/pdf

u


My bad: you either have the shorter version or a different paper (can't open it): if it is the '09 paper, it is still on there though: look for a picture of an ostrich and T-rex skeleton. Then read the caption. You may want to turn off that bogometer of course. It sums up his "hypothesis" well....

@dallen: he's just about the only one there is to cite, since most of the research that agrees with him was done by him.

Also note his peer reviewers aten't named: it isn't necessarily bad, but eith wverything else it just raises more questions.

[dallen68]

@dallen: he's just about the only one there is to cite, since most of the research that agrees with him was done by him.

Also note his peer reviewers aten't named: it isn't necessarily bad, but eith wverything else it just raises more questions.

I was under the impression that the purpose of publishing in a peer reviewed journal, like the Journal of Morphology, was so your paper could be peer reviewed.

[Ibrahim90]

I was under the impression that the purpose of publishing in a peer reviewed journal, like the Journal of Morphology, was so your paper could be peer reviewed.

that's an incomplete picture: you're correct, but it is incomplete.

actually, it tends to be reviewed before publishing by a small number of experts on the field, before being published in a peer-reviewed journal to the larger audience of experts, for broader peer review; you usually see their names in the acknowledgements. There are all matter of reasons for it: clearing up language, rooting out mistakes, etc.

my professor told all sorts of stories about that: if you do your job properly, the paper should be blood red with corrections, notes, comments, etc.

anyways, let me quote the acknowledgements, in full:

This article presents results that were partially
summarized at the symposium ''Functional mor-
phology of the reptilian five chambered heart'' at
the Seventh International Congress of Vertebrate
Morphology in Paris, July 2007, organized by Ken-
neth Kardong, Jeanette Wyneken, and J. Matthias
Starck. The authors also wish to thank the collec-
tions managers and curators of the University of
Kansas Natural History Museum and Biodiversity
Research Center, Division of Ornithology, the
American Museum of Natural History, Department
of Vertebrate Paleontology and the Field Museum,
Department of Geology, Fossil Vertebrates. This
article benefited greatly from the suggestions of
several anonymous reviewers.

the bold part is what I refer to.

what is telling is that a lot of the material mentioned here also comes from other known BANDits: the University of Kansas has one, who indeed runs the museum there.

[MrBogosity]

My bad: you either have the shorter version or a different paper (can't open it): if it is the '09 paper, it is still on there though: look for a picture of an ostrich and T-rex skeleton. Then read the caption. You may want to turn off that bogometer of course. It sums up his "hypothesis" well....

I see it. It's on page 7 of the PDF file and 1238 of the journal. I don't get how he's saying the ostrich's femoral complex is incorporated into the body wall.

Also note his peer reviewers aten't named: it isn't necessarily bad, but eith wverything else it just raises more questions.

The journal selects the reviewers though. Still, it's nice when they publish the results of the peer review. That can be very enlightening.

[Ibrahim90]

I see it. It's on page 7 of the PDF file and 1238 of the journal. I don't get how he's saying the ostrich's femoral complex is incorporated into the body wall.

what he's trying to say, using weasel words, in layman's terms is that the femur doesn't move (it does), and claims its to facilitate breathing (the more limited motion is actually due to changes in the hind limb anatomy--especially the loss muscular tails you find in say, T-rex). but that's not the worst part: now look at the T-rex: when he says its from Osborne, 1916, he isn't talking about its year of description (which was 1905): it's way worse than that. And yes, the reconstruction matters a LOT here. it shows that not only is he wrong, he is LYING. he has to be. how could a guy, in 2009, not have reconstructions that are more up to date?

The journal selects the reviewers though. Still, it's nice when they publish the results of the peer review. That can be very enlightening.

they can. which is why in this particular case, it raises red flags.

it depends on the journal actually: what you say is in fact the norm. sometimes though, the author will send it himself to a host of people who are experts, and those do the reviewing; once they approve, the journal will accept it and publish it: Ruben clearly did the latter (or he was very well connected), otherwise this paper wouldn't have survived a minute of peer review: these "anonymous" people may well have been non-experts who couldn't discern the facts from the bullshit, or may well have been other BANDits. there is a third possibility, and that is his paper was trashed, but was published anyways: that possibility worries me more than the other two.

[dallen68]

OR the paper wasn't dis-proven by the editorial staff of the journal, and it was published pending further collaboration/(opposite of collaboration) for some reason I can't remember what that word is.

[Ibrahim90]

OR the paper wasn't dis-proven by the editorial staff of the journal, and it was published pending further collaboration/(opposite of collaboration) for some reason I can't remember what that word is.

\

unlikely: this was actually Quick's doctoral or thesis work (I'll look it up), so collaboration was not the goal of Ruben--merely to publish this. besides, whenever he did collaborations, it was with other BANDits or (in the earlier days) fence-sitters.

[dallen68]

\

unlikely: this was actually Quick's doctoral or thesis work (I'll look it up), so collaboration was not the goal of Ruben--merely to publish this. besides, whenever he did collaborations, it was with other BANDits or (in the earlier days) fence-sitters.

Well yeah, but in the context I mean the word, the purpose of publishing "anything" is for collaboration/challenge. Papers that challenge the excepted scientific paradigm are considered superior to those that merely collaborate it (as in, okay, we knew that, who gives a F---). If this paper was to be collaborated, it would make Ruben a hero.