Comments inserted below, with much stuff cut out: ---- Matt Chew <[email protected]> wrote: > As of the latest digest I received, this thread had attracted input from > fewer than 0.1% of the list's 12K recipients. Perhaps there are 12K > reasons for remaining unengaged but I suspect they are all variations or > combinations of a few basic themes. Rather than debate plausible > rationalizations, I challenge you all to consider Wayne's question > carefully.
I suspect that for the vast majority of list participants, responding to rhetorical questions like Wayne's is simply a waste of time. Many of them are likely busy practicing ecology. > Are you an ecologist? What makes you one? I still call myself an ecologist, though I seldom actually do any work any more. I have the requisite training (degrees in related sciences including a Ph.D. in Zoology with research emphasis in ecology), experience (I investigated and published on ecological questions and taught ecology for many years), and approach (I used observational and experimental techniques to resolve testable hypotheses). Recycling stuff? Organic > gardening? Watching a TV show? Joining the Sierra Club, Audubon, and/or > TNC (etc.)? Taking a class? Two classes? Earning a certificate? An > Associate's degree? A BA? A BS? An MA? An MS? A Ph.D.? Some other > accredited degree? Working in the field for 1/5/10/20 years? Ecology is a science, like other sciences. One who does not investigate scientifically is not a scientist, hence not an ecologist, regardless of confused beliefs about what constitutes ecology, regardless of training, regardless of degrees and certificates held. > > Should anyone who calls whatever they feel, think or do "ecology" be > considered an ecologist because they call themselves one? Of course not. >If so, why does> ESA have a certification process? Because industry prefers to be able to say that a person whom they pay to do work for them as a contractor is "certified" by an appropriate entity, or because persons feel more authority when they seek contractual employment with industry. Few academic ecologists, unless consulting is important to them, bother with certification. Many industrial ecologists do. >Does that process exclude anyone who > seeks certification? If so, can >excluded individuals still call themselves > an ecologists? Can those of us who never seek certification call ourselves > > ecologists? Likely few or none who lack the published qualifications apply for certification, therefore few or none are excluded. Certification is not a prerequisite for practicing our science. Practicing our science is a prerequisite for being an ecologist. Anyone can call himself anything he wants to. Making such a claim for some professions (military officer, physician, lawyer) might be illegal in some contexts. Claiming degrees, training, or experience one does not have could be grounds for a lawsuit or prosecution for fraud. But simply calling oneself an ecologist through ignorance or puffery is none of those things. But if one has training, or experience, and practices the science of ecology, then one is an ecologist. > > Does being certified mean you know what you're talking about, or merely > that you're using the right words? Being certified means that one applied, and holds the required credentials and experience. It is a screen, but it does not and cannot guarantee competence. > > If ecology means all those things, can it really mean any one of them? Ecology does not mean all of those things, though some folks are confused. > > The impending 100th anniversaries of Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" _Silent Spring_ was published in 1962, not 100 years ago. The fiftieth anniversary of its publication is impending, not the 100th. _Silent Spring_ was a plea for environmental sanity regarding pesticide use, not a founding document for the science of ecology. and of > ESA and BES as organizations are good excuses to ponder all this. > > I'm expecting 12,000 answers by Monday night. But don't cc me. Just > respond to the list. Most list members are more engaged in what they do than they are in responding to rhetorical questions. mcneely
