[WikiEN-l] Expert editors

[Delirium]

Kim van der Linde wrote:
> Delirium wrote:
>
>   
>> No, I can say quite confidently, as a scientist active in academic 
>> publishing, that when reviewing a field (which is what encyclopedia 
>> articles are), science works on consensus, unless you are specifically 
>> writing a "critical review" unapologetically from a particular point of 
>> view. 
>>     
>
> Maybe that your field of expertise works by consensus, mine does not 
> (and honestly, students who think that science works by consensus need 
> to retake philosophy-of-science 101). Consensus is not the same as 
> agreement, and if a topic is really well explored, there might be 
> general agreement among scientists on that topic.
>   

I'm discussing specifically the issue of writing review articles, not of 
doing original research, since that's the closest to what we we're 
doing.  If you're writing a review article about a field that is 
currently in flux and not agreed upon, and you claim it to be an attempt 
at a fair summary of the current debate (not a "critical review"), isn't 
consensus what you're going for, and what journal editors will require?  
A paper like that will typically get farmed out to several reviewers 
from multiple viewpoints, and you'll have to revise it until you reach 
a... consensus... between the author and the reviewers that the paper 
represents a fair summary of the current state of the debate.  If your 
initial review gives short shrift to one of the major camps, for 
example, you're going to have to revise that part until the reviewer 
from that camp is satisfied that you're at least summarizing his views 
accurately.  That's basically what we're doing here, isn't it?

-Mark