Allow me to forthrightly condemn this most outrageous use of taxpayer dollars to continue to fund a "Bigfoot" expert remaining on the payroll of a public university. When will the public stop and realize this is the sort of thing which has caused us to decline as a society and become a nation of former workers watching all our jobs sucked across the seas to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka? Bigfoot, hah. More like Bigboondoggle for Professor Meldrum. Well, now that this has emerged from the dark, dank corners of academia perhaps Meldrum's time at the government teat will come to a close.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get down to my travel agent and deliver that down payment for that "Loch Ness Getaway" me and the wife have been looking forward to.
Illegitimi non carborundum.
The system of tenure is intended to protect professors from "political" influence over their research and promote free inquiry.
In the big scheme of things that's far more important than allowing the occasional crank to keep his job.
In this particular case nothing prevents the university from forcing Prof. bigfoot to raise all his own funding and apply for outside grants. Limit the cost of his position to salary and office space and let him quit if he doesn't like it. It's still basically wasted money, but keeping my first point in mind it seems a small price to pay. It's also a reminder to make sure you only offer tenured positions to people who you want working for you.
tnt needs to track moderation. stats page!
I'm a graduate student nearing completeion of my doctorate at Idaho State University. I am even in the same department as Dr. Meldrum. This is a real sticky subject around the place, I'm sure that is obvious.
However, since Dr. Meldrum has absolutely no say over my academic career (big department) and as I don't have anything libelous to say, I will offer my opinions. I will try to stay professional in spite of my strong feelings on the subject.
Dr. Meldrum's work is without scientific merit. His claims of evidence are bogus and he steps around direct questions aboout his methods. Celebrity endorsements do not add to the credibility of a person's science. In fact, they are usually considered a sure sign of pseudoscience. Scientific discoveries have to withstand scrutiny on the merit of their evidence alone.
None of his work has been published in a peer-reviewed journal, contrary to his repeated claims to the contrary. The journal in question is called the Journal for Scientific Exploration. I'll place links below. Peers are people of equal standing in a group, fellow scientists in this context. JSE accepts *anything* from anybody and rarely has people outside of the editorial board review an article. If they don't put his work in front of other primatologists or anthropologists (Dr. Meldrum received his training in those subjects) then you can't call it peer-reviewed.
This is an exasperating subject for most of us in the department, especially the younger faculty and doctoral students. I personally hate having the name of our university and department attached to his work. I work my ass off every day to try to ensure that my scientific statements are accurate and my conclusions warranted by the evidence. Then I expose my results and conclusions to genuine scrutiny, then incorporate the feedback into my work. This is what scientists do.
I've probably said enough about this. I felt the need to speak up for myself and my department. I really think it's a top-notch department that is unique. We have over 50 faculty whose expertise ranges from ecology, microbiology, resource-management biology, molecular biology, clinical laboratory science, physiology, bioinformatics, genomics and epidemiology. Also bigfoot.
That's my $0.02.
Mitch
Dr. Meldrum's latest publication
Volume 18, Number 1 (Spring 2004) at
http://www.scientificexploration.org/jse/
Why I say they are not a peer reviewed journal...
http://www.scientificexploration.org/jse/author_instr.php
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From their instructions to authors...
Mon Nov 13, 2006 at 06:44:17 AM EST
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"On the matters of interest to the Society for Scientific Exploration, however, consensus does not prevail. Therefore the Journal of Scientific Exploration necessarily publishes claimed observations and proffered explanations that will seem more speculative or less plausible than in some mainstream disciplinary journals."
If you publish in "some" of the "mainstream disciplinary journals," you may not have a big problem with reviewers trashing your work if it is in disagreement with previously published observations. This is what science is.
However, you darn well better sure have well controlled experiments and your work better not better not be the equivalent "Me and Jethro and his buddy went out and we saw a giant sea monster under their Chevy Nova. It's probably the loch ness monster because we have a testimonial from Mr. F, the lead actor from 'For British Eyes Only!'" That is probably "speculative" or "less plausible."
Of course, the above may obviously be hyperbole but my point is that it's not uncommon for journals in science to reject a LARGE percentage of the manuscripts submitted. Some will accept 20 to 30%, and only accept another 10 or 20% after significant revision. Others, such as Science or Nature, only accept the smallest fraction (single digit percentage points) of work submitted, so you can understand why getting work accepted there would be a major career starter or enhancer. Not saying that those articles rejected are bad science, but simply not "novel" enough to get in the top tier journals. That doesn't matter, because each field usually has dozens of smaller, but well respected, archives for submission that would be happy to review and (if warranted) publish the work in question and distribute it to interested parties.
Articles that won't get accepted anywhere but non-peer reviewed "journals" should be considered to bear the bright waving banner of pseudoscience.
Spread it on!
"Do Meldrum's studies raise questions about the viability of unlimited academic freedom in an environment where such credibility issues may end up hurting the university as a whole?"
Many universities have Theology departments, and people don't talk about credibility issues there, unless these tenured theologians think they're also responsible for biology or physics. Meta-physics? Okay there, I suppose.
Academic freedom is really important, and I think the measure should be not what is studied, but how rigorously it is being pursued.
