[X] My Assistant

[David Palmer]

The idea that the Lower Formation of Mt. Sharp is of lacustrine origin (lakebed sediments) has rather fallen out of favor recently, but I just finished my essay on Mars, "An Interpretation of the Geology of Gale Crater & Mount Sharp, with Implications for the History & Habitability of Mars," which I have spent over one year researching and writing, and the primary thrust of this paper is to offer a fresh defense of the lacustrine model, incorporating some fairly original ideas on my part. I'm not a professional scientist, but this is a labor of love that springs from a near-lifelong interest in Mars (since I was a young boy in the 1960s). And I'm trying to publicize it prior to Curiosity reaching Mt. Sharp, as that will be a test of my theories, and I'm hoping to get some recognition if I'm right. So here's the link for all interested readers: http://galecratergeology1.tumblr.com/post/...le-crater-mount

[elakdawalla]

Hi David, it's clear you've put a lot of work into this. I do think you need to recognize the work of others by labeling the images on your pages with the missions and institutions that produced them. A partial list of who should be credited for data of various kinds can be found on this page on copyright on The Planetary Society website.

And this piece of advice is not just for you, but for any non-professional who wants to have their ideas on science taken seriously. It's important to demonstrate that you take other scientists seriously as well. In science you do that by demonstrating an awareness of what other people have written on the topic. Some of what you've written here likely agrees with other scholars; some disagrees. It's on you to show where your ideas fit in -- whose previous scholarship do you agree with? Whose are you contradicting? What specific arguments can you make that demonstrate that your ideas hew closer to the truth than the ones you're contradicting? You certainly wouldn't be the first to talk about lakes within Gale crater, or to map the heights of deltas! There is a very extensive literature on Gale crater already, as I'm sure you know. It's one thing to chitchat on a forum, but if you want to join the scientific conversation you have to listen to what others have to say and make counterarguments, and you demonstrate that you've listened to what others have to say by citing previous work in the area. I don't see a single citation on your page, so what you have right now is a thoughtful and well-illustrated blog entry, not a scholarly contribution. You don't have to be a professional to make a scholarly contribution, but you do have to respect the work of others in order for them to respect yours.

So the next step, if you want to be taken seriously, is to cite previous work, and then distill this into a 2-page abstract and submit it to the next Lunar and Planetary Science Conference; the abstract deadline is usually right around the end of the year. There's no requirement that you be a professional to present work at a conference. Choose a poster presentation rather than a talk; the conversations around posters are much more fruitful.

[David Palmer]

Hi David, it's clear you've put a lot of work into this. I do think you need to recognize the work of others by labeling the images on your pages with the missions and institutions that produced them. A partial list of who should be credited for data of various kinds can be found on this page on copyright on The Planetary Society website.

And this piece of advice is not just for you, but for any non-professional who wants to have their ideas on science taken seriously. It's important to demonstrate that you take other scientists seriously as well. In science you do that by demonstrating an awareness of what other people have written on the topic. Some of what you've written here likely agrees with other scholars; some disagrees. It's on you to show where your ideas fit in -- whose previous scholarship do you agree with? Whose are you contradicting? What specific arguments can you make that demonstrate that your ideas hew closer to the truth than the ones you're contradicting? You certainly wouldn't be the first to talk about lakes within Gale crater, or to map the heights of deltas! There is a very extensive literature on Gale crater already, as I'm sure you know. It's one thing to chitchat on a forum, but if you want to join the scientific conversation you have to listen to what others have to say and make counterarguments, and you demonstrate that you've listened to what others have to say by citing previous work in the area. I don't see a single citation on your page, so what you have right now is a thoughtful and well-illustrated blog entry, not a scholarly contribution. You don't have to be a professional to make a scholarly contribution, but you do have to respect the work of others in order for them to respect yours.

So the next step, if you want to be taken seriously, is to cite previous work, and then distill this into a 2-page abstract and submit it to the next Lunar and Planetary Science Conference; the abstract deadline is usually right around the end of the year. There's no requirement that you be a professional to present work at a conference. Choose a poster presentation rather than a talk; the conversations around posters are much more fruitful.

Excuse me, but I cite 66 references in my essay! In fact, that part of my essay is something I put a great deal of work into, it was one of the most time-consuming parts of the process. And as regards the pictures, I state at the beginning of the references, "All photos courtesy of NASA/JPL unless stated otherwise." And when a figure is not from NASA, I do credit it when talking about the figure in the text.

One thing I do differently in my essay, as compared with most academic papers, is to not give captions for the pictures, but to place those pictures directly in the location where I am talking about them. This is in response to something I have found INCREDIBLY irritating about most scientific papers, having to go back and forth in the document to see the figures being referred to. I aimed to make it flow a lot smoother, to read a lot easier.

Dave

[djellison]

And when a figure is not from NASA, I do credit it when talking about the figure in the text.

You've included images that I know are not NASA's that do not have a credit in the text, next to the image, or anywhere else.

There is no way to know if an image is NASA's or not.

Moreover - the images that do originate from NASA - "All photos courtesy of NASA/JPL" for most of the images you use - that is an insufficient and in many cases an incorrect credit.

Just one example - the last image of Page 1 is clearly an HRSC image. I see no credit whatsoever.

The image credit should, at the very least, be

CODE

ESA/DLR/FU Berlin

And more properly in a publication should be

CODE

G. Neukum, R. Jaumann, and the HRSC Co-Investigator and Experiment Team, HRSC: The High Resolution Stereo Camera of Mars Express, in Mars Express: The scientific payload, edited by A. Wilson, pp. 17-35, ESA, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, 2004.

R. Jaumann, G. Neukum, T. Behnke, T.C. Duxburry, K. Eichentopf, S. van Gasselt, B. Giese, K. Gwinner, E. Hauber, H. Hoffmann, A. Hoffmeister, U. Köhler, K.-D. Matz, T.B. McCord, V. Mertens, J. Oberst, R. Pischel, D. Reiß, E. Ress, T. Roatsch, P. Saiger, F. Scholten, G. Schwarz, K. Stephan, M. Wählisch, and the HRSC Co-Investigator Team: The High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) Experiment on Mars Express: Instrument Aspects and Experiment Conduct from Interplanetary Cruise through Nominal Mission, Planetary and Space Science, 55, 928-952, 2007.

If you want to retain flow.... put a one line caption and credit with every single image.

It also is very very easy to miss your references, because they're only at the end of the fourth webpage. Ideally - they should be at the bottom of each section as appropriate.