On Fri, 24 Oct 2003 07:25:31 -0500, Aaron Baugher
wrote:
snip

"We had a tough time getting our results published - it took 18
months altogether," she says. "The big journals really couldn't
handle it. But we're not endorsing the diet: it's just our results."

That's really, really sad. Any journal that refuses to publish
research simply because it doesn't like the results should cease to
exist. They aren't supposed to be in the business of suppressing
knowledge.

It's the way ALL reputable scientific journals operate.

Papers come in. The editors send them off to other reputable
scientists in that particular field to be reviewed - basically, the
editors want to make sure the paper is 'good science'. The editor
then takes into account the comments of the reviewer(s) as to whether
or not the paper is plausible, is well written and the experiments (if
any) described therein are good science in deciding whether to reject
the paper outright, ask for revision and resubmission or publish it.
If your work happens to be in accord with current thinking on the
topic, it's more likely to be published or at least only minor
revision before publication. If your work, no matter how well
researched, does NOT fit with current thinking it's more likely to be
rejected.

As it happens, this is a situation that effects my family on a regular
basis.

My husband is a professional Research Scientist. His paid work is as
a civilian scientist attached to the Australian Defence Force. He
publishes about 5 or so papers a year (mostly classified, or I'd point
you to them) in that field and they are rarely returned for more than
minor revision before publication. He also has (classified) Patents
in his name for his sonar enhancement system (ISHTAR - you can see
some unclassified information at
http://www.dsto.defence.gov.au/corpo...industry1.html
if you're interested in what he gets up to).

His PhD work was in Tachyon Physics. His theories in this field are
VERY controversial, although they fit better with established
knowledge than do the current theories in this field. It takes him
approximately 3 years of revision and resubmission to get every paper
published. It's not that his papers in Tachyons are poorly written.
It's not that his papers are poorly researched. It's just that most
of the reviewers out there *have a vested interest in having *their*
theories be the accepted ones* so they reject papers showing that they
might have been wrong.

Since most editors of journals *don't* have the expertise to be a
peer-reviewer of *every* subject that their journal covers they have
to rely on the judgements of those who *do* have the expertise. This
is true throughout all the branches of science. And, since
scientists are no less human than anyone else you might meet (although
some people might think so) they *do* tend to unconsciously protect
their livelihoods by demanding greater proof of controversial papers
than they might of ones that support their own views.

Aramanth