Re: To make a journal for amateur scientist.

On Fri, 19 Dec 2008, Jang Jin Hong wrote:

The example who criticize amateur scientists quoting psycholoy is
Eric Gisse.

The paper he referred to reports research showing that some deeply unskilled people have a very high opinion of their own level of ability. Do you disagree with the research? Why? You made a blanket criticism of psychology not being science - why? Can you make specific criticisms of the research reported in the paper referred to?

Referring to the paper doesn't criticise amateurism, per se, but incompetence. Specifically, incompetence accompanied by delusions of super-competence.

Now, it would be difficult for scientists with such traits to get very far in professional science, while there are amateur would-be scientists who believe they have the skills and ability to revolutionise physics, while not even understanding basic mathematics such as calculus or even the simplest of existing theories. How to revolutionise something you don't understand the fundamentals of?

It is impossible to define whether theory is true or wrong
at the first publishing stage,

Sometimes it's possible to see immediately that it's wrong. Especially if it is trying to explain existing experiment/observation and fails miserably, not even making the grade as a useful approximation or model.

All of theories on superconductivity have been failed.

Have they? I've not aware of any universally applicable general theory of superconductivity, but there are existing theories which work adequately within their domains of applicability. It's OK for a theory to have limited applicability, and it certainly doesn't mean it's a failure (even if it's incomplete, or in some technical sense, "wrong").

but editors of journal have not criticized by that kind of
publishing.
but if amateur's article is published and that is proven wrong,
editors of journal will be harshly criticized.

Why? If "wrong" is the normal state of such theories, why would it incur criticism? If the paper is well-written, mathematically correct and consistent, and sensible, but turns out to be wrong, well, that's common enough. Publishing complete garbage might incur criticism, especially if they're trying to maintain or build a high reputation for the journal, but again, that's a question of quality.

Journal editors have no reason to challenge that kind of danger,
so all of amateur's article is rejected in first stage.

I have not find any article of amateurs
in physics review letter and physics review.
Of course, majority of article must be institution employed authors.
But if all of articles were come from institutions,
we can conclude that is another editorial policy.

A quick look in PRE finds 1 in recent issues. This was just a quick look, not a thorough search. I'm not going to look at every abstract to check author affiliations.

There is some fraud in science,
but most of fraud come from eminent professionals.
Amateur's social statue in science is not eminent,
so it is very difficult for them to swindle others.
look at Madoff, people's belief about authority
is necessity condition for faud.

Professional scientific fraud (falsiying or fabricating data) and other misconduct (plagiarism) is generally aimed at fooling professionals. Amateur scientific fraud is, from what I've seen, aimed at fooling the public, in getting people to acclaim the perpetrator as a Great Heroic Scientist, buying a book full of nonsense, or investing in a known-to-not-work scheme. It can be difficult to distinguish this type of fraud from honest mistakes (the author might sincerely believe the book to be a great contribution to science, and themselves the greatest scientist ever (read the psychology paper!)). It is, however, usually clearly different from professional fraud in both intent and execution.

(And you're bringing psychology into it with your statements about the Madoff case!)

--
Timo

.

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