[meteorite-list] [IMCA] Update 2 - Wilbur Wash (correction)

From: Jason Utas <meteoritekid_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2010 00:14:09 -0800
Message-ID: <AANLkTi=S0io4rdRoUfgX13Sq3qgLk_G6FvXmtR7kgr1o_at_mail.gmail.com>

Hello Martin, All,

> although I'm not so rhetorically trained like you, I guess,
> you started (once again) in your initial email with a post hoc ergo propter
> hoc..

After all, if I knew you would reply anyways.... ; )

>>The greater good of....
>>..... don't teach us anything new.
>
> 1st - who else is still classifying "thousands" of OCs aside the classifiers
> involved in the Antarctics?

There are 3256 approved/official NWA meteorites, of which 2325 are
ordinary chondrites.
To say nothing of the countless Omani finds as well as those from
elsewhere, yes, thousands are being analyzed. By whom? By many
researchers worldwide.

> 2nd - why then such a legal drama in so many countries, regarding ownership,
> heritage, ect. if that stuff is so uninteresting?

Two reasons.

One is the fact that they're worth so much.

The other is that no lawmakers know enough about meteorites to say "no
meteorites other than ordinary chondrites may leave our country."
Well, even if they did, it would be a useless law, because a country
that tried to do that would have to train its customs officers to
recognize the difference between an achondrite and a common chondrite.
 And that's not going to happen.

>>No. ?They're generally expected to write a papers/conduct research at
>>a set rate
>
> Difficult to write a paper, if you don't have results from analyzes to write
> about.
> At least until meteoritics will be reckoned to the humanities. ? (Quiet
> Mathias!)

I agree - but if we're to assume that scientists discard ordinary
chondrites and work only on the 'interesting' meteorites, then they're
still going to have new meteorites to write papers about.

>>paid only to
>>conduct research
>
> I think most of them understand analyses of new meteorites as research too.

Many researchers' jobs depend on their writing 1-2+ research papers
per year, and there's no provision about analyzing new meteorites
(I've spoken with a few who analyze meteorites for whom this is the
case). Analyzing a new meteorite is a task that takes up time and
money that they could otherwise have put towards their research
project, and there is little incentive to do it.

>>I'm not going to ask
>>Bill Gates to analyze all of the meteorites in the world just because
>>he makes the most money.
>
> Right, but would you pay in a restaurant to the bill an extra for the cook,
> if the egg in your diner was not uncooked?

It is the cook's job to cook the egg I eat at a restaurant. What you
don't seem to understand is that many researchers are hired for
research -- and the analysis of new meteorites isn't part of their job
description. It would be a much better question to ask if you think
you should tip the waited if the service was excellent, but the egg
undercooked. Because it wasn't the waiter's fault that the egg was
underdone. Rather, it was the chef's fault, and they almost never
share tips.

>>Furthermore, you seem to have completely missed the point
>
> I don't think so, cause that's why we personally spare the classifiers the
> OCs and the "junk" meteorites.
>
> But I'm glad to see advances in your opinion.

You do? I just spent the afternoon at UCLA, and saw excel
spreadsheets full of submissions of NWA ordinary chondrites - the fact
that 71.4% of all approved NWA's are ordinary chondrites should tell
you as much.

>>isn't easy to decipher.
> Doesn't matter, was off-topic.
>
>>But you seem to be equating
>>working in a lab analyzing meteorites to the profession of finding and
>>dealing meteorites.
>
> In no way. That would be in contrary to the above, a cum hoc ergo propter
> hoc from your side :-)

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/cumhocfa.html

So A is true and B is true, but A doesn't cause B? There's no way
that my interpretation of what you said as a comparison between two
professions is a cum hoc, ergo propter hoc. That just doesn't make
sense.

Let me quote you:

> Although I concede, that the modern practice to give scientists, especially
> the younger and in branches with an excess supply of applicants, only serial
> contracts of always maximum 2 years, is quite shabby, cause they are often
> so lousy endowed, that they reach almost the level of successful planetaries
> recoverers only. I hope in overseas it's better?)
> So it can be a pretty thankless job.
> Sounds like the description of a meteorite hunter, dealer, finder,
> who mainly have to live from their passion :-)

Yes, you are comparing scientists to meteorite hunters/dealers. This
has nothing to do with cum hoc, ergo propter hoc.

...

>>Have you been reading the recent posts?
>
> Is Catterton & J**** "plenty"?

You seem to think that if someone disagrees with you and your idea
that all meteorites should be found as quickly as possible without a
care for proper documentation (at least coordinates), they must be
against all meteorite dealers.

I don't have a latin phrase for that kind of assumption, but rest
assured, it doesn't make sense.

>>So you're saying that these scientists should be analyzing meteorites
>>because it's their passion.
>
> No. Where?

Right here:

---
Jason: So it can be a pretty thankless job. [In reference to
scientists not getting paid for analyzing meteorites -- and
subsequently getting criticized for occasionally misplacing a sample.]
Martin: Sounds like the description of a meteorite hunter, dealer,
finder, who mainly have to live from their passion  :-)
But if a scientist has a passion for meteorites, I think, it can be also a
fulfilling occupation, can't it?
---
You suggest that scientists should analyze meteorites even if they're
not getting paid to do it -- because they
"have a passion for meteorites."
>>rather than
>>performing original research
>
> Aha. Papers introducing and dealing with the analyzes of aspects of newly
> found meteorites are no original research? Not sure, what most meteoricists
> would say to that opinion....
They might be -- but most departments and researchers don't want their
work to depend on whatever the next dealer or hunter might bring
through the door.  Most researchers have specialities and some work
for decades on refining or refuting a single idea.  There's a reason
why McCoy has written tens of papers on the acapulcoite/lodranite
parent body and its pertogenesis.
It's because that's what he wants to study and work on.
If you told all scientists to rely on new meteorites that they analyze
for their research, all would have a better understanding of the
classification scheme for meteorites, but I doubt we would know much
about the rare types of meteorites and what they teach us, because
most researchers, if they were lucky, would see only a few of each
rarer type in their entire careers.
>>I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.
>
> I try to say, that there is an enormous cliff in such countries, like
> Australia, like Algeria (cause Greg menrionned in) between the auxesis of
> meteorites as objects of highest national and cultural interest and
> consequently the legal ban that any private finger may touch such an object,
> up to the infraction into highest personal rights, like disappropriation
> and on the other hand, they (and sometimes those "they" include the sharpest
> agitators for such prohibitions)
> do absolutely nothing with the finds.
Are you really kicking this dead horse?  Nothing I've said prior to
this message even referred to this issue.  My first email asked people
to lay off of researchers who have mislaid samples for a while -- and
you're trying to turn it into this same old argument again?
No, Martin.  Just...no.  We understand each other's points of view,
and we know where we disagree.
If you want to duke it out, find me in Tucson and we can do it over a
drink or something like that.
Enough.
Regards,
Jason

Received on Tue 21 Dec 2010 03:14:09 AM PST