Well, there may be no one besides me who's interested in this, but I'm going to let you have it anyway.
In a recent post discussing the phenomenon of accomplished scientists with peculiar beliefs, I referred to Dr. Brigitte Boisselier, a bishop in the Raelian religion. I said this: "I was so incredulous concerning Dr. Bosselier's claimed degrees that I recently verified them. Through the magic of e-mail, I was able to find and query her dissertation advisor. He confirmed that she has a Ph.D. from the University of Houston (1985) in chemistry and the equivalent of an M.S. degree from the University of Dijon, France (often incorrectly claimed to be another Ph.D. in chemistry)." I was pleased with myself. But it turns out that the answer was apparently already waiting for me in the January 17th issue of _Science_ on my coffee table at home, unread. In its "Random Samples" section, under the heading "Clone Queen Has Two Ph.D.s", they discussed the matter, and quoted her dissertation advisor Dr. Karl Kadish as saying she was a "good, conscientious student". Only they got it wrong. Because he told me (as I told TIPS) that "She has the equivalent of an M.S. degree from the University of Dijon...the Dijon degree was once called the "Docteur de Troisieme Cycle" which loosely translated is a doctorate (although it is not)." So _Science's_ error is understandable, but not the implied endorsement of it by Dr. Kadish. He never said "two Ph.D.s". Stephen ______________________________________________________________ Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. tel: (819) 822-9600 ext 2470 Department of Psychology fax: (819) 822-9661 Bishop's University e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Lennoxville, QC J1M 1Z7 Canada Dept web page at http://www.ubishops.ca/ccc/div/soc/psy TIPS discussion list for psychology teachers at http://www.frostburg.edu/dept/psyc/southerly/tips _________________________________________________________ --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
