Chapter 13
May 23, 2010

Sexy Science: Daring Development or Ill-considered Idea? [ARNS]

by FRED CHARUNDER-MACHARRUNDEIRA, Alternate Reality News Service Science Writer

Over a small stage hang two very large American flags. That's the way of things, I suppose: the smaller your economy shrinks, the greater must be your symbols of patriotic fervour. Over the hum of the crowd, Joe Walsh's "Rocky Mountain Way" is destroying cilia in ears throughout the (barely) auditor(y)ium. To the left of the stage, fireworks explode; through the smoke and the spectral shapes swimming in their retinas, the audience can make out an 82 year-old man shambling out to the podium, accompanied by two scantily clad beach blondshells known as "Percy's Posse."

Percy Seltzermann clears his throat and, in halting speech made less comprehensible by intermittent eruptions of a Peruvian accent, reads a paper on the impossibility of solving the Collatz Problem.

The crowd is stunned. Whether by the logic of Seltzermann's mathematical proofs or the ringing in their ears is impossible to say.

"What?" shouted Nacho Jones, a public relations guru who represents many of today's leading scientists. "I can't hear - can you write your question down?"

After he read my question, Jones responded: "Oh. No, Professor Seltzermann was not on any drugs. I mean, he was on Lipitor for his cholesterol, but, be fair, he had been in the OR for heart surgery more times than Charlie Sheen had been in - no, I won't go there. Let's just say that he was entitled. But, no, no stimulants, no psychedelics and certainly no steroids. Professor Seltzermann did his mathematics clean!"

Jones insisted that Professor Seltzermann's collapse after reading his paper at the conference was a result of too much stimulation. "His doctors told him to slow down, but you know Professor Seltzermann," Jones insisted. "He could never stay away from the spotlight for too long. Have you seen Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler? Prof Seltzermann was like that, only without Evan Rachel Wood."

The death of Professor Seltzermann has highlighted - in flourescent lime green - a growing concern that treating scientists like Hollywood stars stands to actually undercut public understanding of cutting edge research.

[EDITRIX-IN-CHIEF'S NOTE: JESUS BEGESUS, Fred - if you had backed into this lede any further your readers would think they were sodomizing you! Look, I've just about given up on the issue of buried ledes, but could you at least try not to pile so much dirt on the coffin? When writing your articles, think shallow grave. Okay? Shallow grave. BB-G]

"Okay, sure, Pocky gave his paper to 12,000 cheering fans in an overflowing stadium," groused Rainer Werner Bassfinder, a particle physicist with the Secure the Perimeter Institute in someplace you've never heard of. "But, how many of them understood a word he said? Five? Ten, maybe? Granted, that's about as many as would understand his papers at academic conferences, but, since the audience at conferences is much smaller, the comprehension quotient is much higher."

"Uh, yeah," Jones stated. "The thing you have to appreciate about Prof Bassfinder is that his holiday special about string theory didn't get as many viewers as A Charlie Brown Christmas, so it's understandable that he's bitter..."

"I'm not bitter!" Bassfinder not bitterly shouted. "I never expected a large audience - you can't compete with an annual classic!"

After taking a moment to collect his stamps, Bassfinder calmly continued: "The point is that Percy Seltzermann was a tenured professor of highest mathematics. He taught at the University of People Smarter Than You Doing Research You Couldn't Possibly Comprehend in Tubingen, North Dakota. He deserved better than to die in front of 12,000 screaming...adoring...uhh, fans. Okay, the adoring fans bit is kind of nice, but it's just not...dignified."

Jones scoffed at the notion that self-promotion was undignified. He pointed out that we live in a marketplace of ideas, and research into how the brain stores memories that could lead to a cure for degenerative diseases like Alzheimer's was losing out to the jingle for a tampon commercial.

"And, not even a memorable jingle," Jones pointed out. Whether or not the tampon was memorable, he didn't say.

At this point, Bassfinder had walked out of our interview, but, if he hadn't, he likely would have pointed out, as others have, that popularity could drive scientists to fudge their data. An astronomer, for instance, might be tempted to say that he had found evidence of the existence of 127 planets that might sustain life, instead of the 17 that the evidence actually supported. Or, an archaeologist might exaggerate the number of vertebrae she had found in a Middle Eastern dig to make the dinosaur they came from look more fearsome.

Jones rolled his eyes. "It's not like scientists weren't fudging data before we decided to make them famous," he pointed out. "Only, now, instead of bitchy applause from half a dozen jealous colleagues, they get the roar of the crowd and major endorsement income. I think the trade-off is worth it."

Jones argued that, unlike rock stars and athletes, scientists actually created things that made the world a better place. Drugs. Better ways of communicating. Crystalline toilet paper dispensers. Scientists were the ones who really deserved to have their work celebrated. "And, if that means the occasional death of an elderly mathematician," he observed, "that's just the price society should be willing to pay!"

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