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Dear Kalina,
but Galileo might indeed prove what he was supporting. Appearently, as Ivan
wrote, this is not always the case in Earth Sciences, is it?
Nanni
At 18:59 Uhr +0000 06.12.1999, kalina wrote:
>Dear Ivan and all,
>
>This is just to remind you that Galileo was prosecuted by the Inquisition
>for the radical idea of the world being round.
>So maybe some self-criticism would help for adjusting the
>"long-established truth", just as Simon, below, said.
>
>Kalina Shipkova, PhD
>
>
>>Dear Ivan (and list),
>>All that you say is true, but the self-deception lies almost as often in
>>the "long-established truth" as it does in the views of the newcomers.
>>Examples on request.
>>
>>Simon
>>
>>In message <[log in to unmask]>,
>>Ivan Zagorchev <[log in to unmask]> writes
>>>Dear All
>>>
>>>Scientific fraud or/and misinformation has been repeatedly quoted in
>>>"Nature" and other scientific journals. I have been recently worried myself
>>>by the increasing number of publications that contain geological
>>>misinformation. Some aspects of this problem are included in my paper
>>>"Geology in the Science Market: Benefits and Hazards" now in press in
>>>"Episodes", vol. 22 (1999) No 4. However, I would like to share with the
>>>Geo-Tectonics List Members the following considerations issued from nearly
>>>40 years of extensive field geology:
>>>
>>>The whole history of natural sciences may be probably regarded as a
>>>continuous disprovement of ruling or fashionable hypotheses, and their
>>>replacement by other quite plausible hypotheses that are intended to better
>>>fit the available evidence. There is one basic rule, and it is that every
>>>new hypothesis should take in consideration ALL firmly established facts. In
>>>case some of the known facts do not fit the hypothesis and/or contradict it,
>>>they should be carefully checked. It is not advisable to publish any new
>>>hypothesis (or its application to a given region) if you have not shown that
>>>the previously published contradicting evidence was erroneous. (All above is
>>>a slightly re-worded excerpt from a textbook for Natural History teachers
>>>that has been first published in 1925!).
>>>
>>>When you come to the field and laboratory evidence, it can be distorted due
>>>to different causes, and I shall briefly outline some of them here:
>>>
>>>1. Lack of professional skills. Many "theoretical" tectonists nowadays
>>>simply do not recognize the principal rock types. I know cases when at least
>>>twenty geologists have not recognized such typical rocks as diatomites. In
>>>many cases, even dolomites are confused with sandstones. The most typical
>>>cases concern sedimentary breccia: very often it is taken for tectonic
>>>breccia, and vice versa. Mylonites sometimes are "determined" as marls,
>>>limestones or conglomerates. This list may be continued almost
>>>indefinitely.
>>> It should be said, that in some cases the recognition of some rock
>>>types may be considerably hampered by bad exposure and external similarity.
>>>However, in all cases when a rock unit or rock type is "renamed", all proofs
>>>of the former publications should be carefully checked.
>>> For example, a typical case of coarse sedimentary breccia and
>>>conglomerate with sandstone interbeds (containing abundant coalefied plant
>>>debris, discernible leaves and stems included) and coal lenses (all known
>>>since 1844 - 1912 - 1932 - 1983, to cite only the milestones) have been
>>>proclaimed "autoclastic tectonic breccia formed in greenschist-facies
>>>conditions"!!
>>>
>>>2. Lack of knowledge about some more or less rare ("exotic") geological
>>>phenomena. Such are melange, different types of olistostrome, neptunian
>>>clastic dykes, etc. In such cases, many geologists tend to "label" the rock
>>>unit with a known name. Recently, a group of colleagues revisited an area
>>>where large breccia outcrops were reported in 1978 as "tectonic breccia
>>>filling in large open fissures along a deep-seated fault", and in 1992,, as
>>>"nappe of a tectonic unit built up of a Triassic formation, thrust over
>>>Upper Cretaceous marls". Both assertions were wrong: it was a clear case of
>>>olistostrome within the marls, and both the matrix and the underlying and
>>>overlying marls yilded Upper Cretaceous foraminifers and calcareous
>>>nannofossils (paper in preparation by I. Boyanov et al.).
>>>
>>>3. Maybe in the most extremal and blameworthy case, supervisors request from
>>>their students (undergraduate and Ph. D.) to "prove" at any rate a given
>>>tectonic hypothesis in their terrains. A lot of positive evidence is
>>>neglected or distorted, and new "evidence" is simply fabricated. I have
>>>several typical cases in mind. One of them (from Sakar Mountain, SE
>>>Bulgaria): a well-known fact is that high-grade metamorphics cross-cut by
>>>500 Ma granitoids are covered with depositional contact by Late Palaeozoic
>>>and Triassic conglomerates that contain pebbles from both metamorphics and
>>>granitoids; a Mesozoic (post-Triassic) metamorphic event resulted in
>>>amphibolite-facies metamorphism overprinted also on the pre-Mesozoic rocks
>>>(publications by Chatalov, Boyanov and others). Recently, this evidence is
>>>simply neglected, and all metamorphics are ascribed to a single Alpine
>>>metamorphic event at c. 140 Ma based on K-Ar dating of biotite (remember:
>>>threshold temperature of only about 250 degree C!).
>>> Some students and/or lecturers do not even hesitate to "transplant"
>>>(on paper) fossils from their actual occurrence to "mute" formations, for to
>>>be able to "prove" their ideas! As the old Bulgarian proverb says, "the lie
>>>has short legs", and all such cases usually come out very soon on the
>surface!
>>>
>>>I believe that it will be highly useful and instructive for geology
>>>lecturing if a booklet containing the clearest and most instructive cases of
>>>geological errors would be prepared and published. I can contribute with
>>>several cases of self-deception, with cases of erroneous evidence due to bad
>>>exposure, and with cases in which the highly erroneous conclusions may come
>>>either from lack of professional skills, or are a result of scientific fraud
>>>and fabrication of data. I would be glad to have some colleague(s) with
>>>similar cases as co-author(s).
>>>
>>>Please, do inform me in case you would be interested.
>>>
>>>Ivan
---------------------------------------------------------
Gianpino Walter Bianchi
Institut fuer Geowissenschaften
Mineralogie - Petrologie
Universitaet Potsdam
Postfach 601553
D-14415 POTSDAM - Deutschland
e-mail:[log in to unmask]
Tel.: +49 331 977 2649
FAX: +49 331 977 2087
http://www.uni-potsdam.de/u/Geowissenschaft/index.htm
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