IGNORE-ance

RANT #5: Abraham Lincoln said it first and then was wrong about the Gettysburg Address but I can get it right: "the world will little note nor long remember what we say here." My proof is already established. I wrote my essay "The Phenomenal Universe" and really felt it was worthy of professional criticism. First to two science magazines, American Scientist and then to AAAS Science, then to a long list of 40 university scientists, and finally to a dozen or so participants in a SPIE conference on "the nature of the photon." I sent a cover email with the paper as an attachment. I asked for criticism and got two polite declines (from the only two women on the list) and maybe a half dozen promises to look at it without ever responding again, one invitation to collaborate but no analysis of my paper and the only sincere response of all but with one of the sorriest statements: "It is fun to speculate about new fundamental theories but its nearly impossible to catch up with where the theory is now at without spending a lifetime at it. Gone are the days of the lonely patent clerk. I'm an experimentalist so no expert in any matters in the second half of your paper, which I read through. the first half I do know something about, and your treatment seems far from adding new significant elements. (You asked for an honest opinion.) Basically you discuss certain wavepacket solutions of some generic wave equation. It could be the Maxwell equations. However, this says nothing about the quantum theory of light or photons (which are not simply wavepackets, but something much deeper as illustrated by things like the bell inequality violation experiments). I have dabbled in this subject, although it pushes me beyond what I know." if you'd like the detail visit (Ebony Dungeon) Webaddress. The italics in bold are mine and represent what I call "professionalism" which is the narrowing of specialists and a future rant.