Summaries of recent science and technology news reported by Mike Martin for various publications. For these stories and others, visit http://www.weeklyscientist.com or click the individual links below.
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This Week: The Dark Tower? -- Tales of Intrigue from the Ivory Tower
IN FROM THE COLDA Toronto physicist's once-ridiculed theory gains acceptance published by MacLean'shttp://www.macleans.ca/topstories/science/article.jsp?content=56935
TORONTO PHYSICIST John Moffat, who has made a career of questioning the cosmos, faces a vexing question himself. Does he feel vindicated, people ask, now that his controversial theory about the speed of light is finally getting the recognition it deserves? The soft-spoken, 70-year-old Moffat might answer with a resounding "yes," if not for a painful irony -- while publicity is shining on his theory, the media are lavishing credit on another scientist.
Scientific Researchers Routinely Fudge Citations published by NewsFactorhttp://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/22423.html
Tomorrow's advances -- which usually start out in today's academic journals -- may be the product of cheating, say UCLA researchers who claim that scientists routinely lie about the amount of research they perform before publishing their innovations. Using a cunning schoolchild's most common ploy -- copying someone else's work -- scientists fill their bibliographies with titles from papers they never read, claim UCLA electrical engineering professors Mikhail Simkin and Vwani Roychowdhury.
In the shadow of the speed of lightpublished by The St. Louis Journalism Review http://www.stljr.org http://www.weeklyscientist.com/articles/Moffat.htm
In recent issues of Discover, Publisher's Weekly, the Christian Science Monitor, and other well-regarded magazines, some of the world's best science journalists misled readers by omitting important facts about research reported by scientists John Moffat, João Magueijo, and a best-selling book on the speed of light.
Open-Source Software Debate Reaches Ivory Towerspublished by NewsFactorhttp://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/22281.html
The near-absolute democracy of open-source software is tantamount to academic peer review, the process by which important research passes the scrutiny of expert critics to get published in major journals, argues a Stanford University researcher.
Depending on the story, please mention Maclean's, the St. Louis Journalism Review, or NewsFactor as the source and, if publishing online, please carry the relevant hyperlinks that accompany each story.
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