Hi all,
I have just gone back through and read all the posts on this very interesting
topic which as a committee member of the Australian Bird Study Association
which publishes the journal Corella has been the subject of many discussions.
Firstly, I would like to defend Steve somewhat. One of the purposes of an
editorial is as a commentary on a subject written to promote consideration of
an issue(s). I think Steve has done just that! The many posts on birding-aus
about the subject would surely make Steve happy he took the time to put his
thoughts to paper.
As an ornithologist myself (I still use the term lightly, when does one
actually become qualified in a particular field?) I would like to make the
point that there is a HUGE amount of information that can be added to the
massive amount already collected. For example, there are most definitely not
1000's of search results pages when googling Hall's babbler. It is naieve to
think that we have enough information about any particular species. This
particularly applies to common or 'least concern' species that may become
threatened in the future. Not to pat myself on the back but this is indeed the
case with Hall's Babbler. Furthermore, amateurs can add immensely to research
being conducted by professionals (I follow Chris Lloyd's definitions of these
terms). One of the research projects I am currently looking at makes use of
records collected by a huge number of mostly amateur people to explore
management issues for Hall's babbler. So, what may be perceived by someone
(including the observer) as an insignificant observation may be a valuable
little titbit of information that builds a larger picture, supports an idea or
stimulates further research/inquiry for someone else. Birding-aus provides a
great forum for submitting these observations, but also for asking whether they
are worthy of publishing.
With regards to reporting observations via birding-aus versus an
ornithological publication (journal), with my professional hat on I have the
following comments. First, I think it is great that birding-aus and other
internet mediums have made it possible to rapidly report all sorts of
information that may appear to some as uninteresting, but may get the adrenalin
surging for others. One of the things I did before even going out to the field
to find Hall's babblers for my PhD was to search birding-aus for any reports on
the species. The internet thus provides the opportunity to record observations
that may never end up being recorded (in a journal or otherwise) for various
reasons (including time constraints on our lives!). Second, the down side to
using the net rather than a publication is that the peer-review process has
been bypassed. In the context of amateurs publishing there are two important
roles that this process plays: 1) professionals are usually involved in the
process and can comment on whether sufficient information has been provided so
that the work is useful to people in the future, 2) it improves the confidence
a reader can have in the work once it has been published where contacting the
author is no longer possible, this is because the interpretations are subject
to scrutiny by others with knowledge in the area.
To address the issue Steve was initially exploring, I believe there is another
reason, in addition to those already proposed by others, that has contributed
to the decline in publications by amateurs. Improvements in scientific practice
and reporting, competition between journals and competition amongst researchers
for funding, has led to an increase in the standards expected of published (and
submitted) works in journals today. I believe that this inhibits the
publication by amateurs of incidental or less rigorously collected
observations. This also applies to professionals, I include myself here. For
example, there is often more natural history type information in an unpublished
thesis than in the publications that result, yet this information can be
valuable to anyone working on that species or a related species in the future
(I am a case in point). As an aside, within academia I have detected a
widespread attitude that research needs to be 'cutting edge' and test the
latest ideas, or else investigate the processes and factors underlying what is
observed in the natural world. Many journals also expect this, or at least that
the observations reported be put in a much broader context. Reporting purely
natural history information seems substandard, regardless of the quality of the
science behind the data. I think this is ignorant as the incentive and
motivation for many research questions is founded in natural history
information of a species. Furthermore, it is naieve to think we have sufficient
natural history information for all species.
Well, this my 'rant on the rant' as someone put it.
Cheers,
Dean
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